life: acoustic & amplified

poetry, quotes & thoughts about life

Archive for the category “Change”

22 May 2015

just this…

  

Photo by Charlie Doane @ Branford, CT 

 Only a beige slat of sun 
above the horizon, like a shade pulled 

not quite down. Otherwise, 

clouds. Sea rippled here and 

there. Birds reluctant to fly. 

The mind wants a shaft of sun to 

stir the grey porridge of clouds, 

an osprey to stitch sea to sky 

with its barred wings, some dramatic 

music: a symphony, perhaps 

a Chinese gong. 
But the mind always 

wants more than it has— 

one more bright day of sun, 

one more clear night in bed 

with the moon; one more hour 

to get the words right; one 

more chance for the heart in hiding 

to emerge from its thicket 

in dried grasses—as if this quiet day 

with its tentative light weren’t enough, 

as if joy weren’t strewn all around. 

🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈

Mind Wanting More by Holly Hughes

   
 

 Listen to my favorite song ❤️http://youtu.be/A3yCcXgbKrE

🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈

other photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

 

Posted in attitude, awareness, beauty, Change, Choice, connection, courage, determination, Faith, find art at pinterest, strength, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
18 May 2015

unseen business

 Because no one could ever praise me enough,
because I don’t mean these poems only
but the unseen
unbelievable effort it takes to live
the life that goes on between them,
I think all the time about invisible work.
About the young mother on Welfare
I interviewed years ago,
who said, “It’s hard.
You bring him to the park,
run rings around yourself keeping him safe,
cut hot dogs into bite-sized pieces for dinner,
and there’s no one
to say what a good job you’re doing,
how you were patient and loving
for the thousandth time even though you had a headache.”
And I, who am used to feeling sorry for myself
because I am lonely,
when all the while,
as the Chippewa poem says, I am being carried
by great winds across the sky,
thought of the invisible work that stitches up the world day and night,
the slow, unglamorous work of healing,
the way worms in the garden
tunnel ceaselessly so the earth can breathe
and bees ransack this world into being,
while owls and poets stalk shadows,
our loneliest labors under the moon.

There are mothers
for everything, and the sea
is a mother too,
whispering and whispering to us
long after we have stopped listening.
I stopped and let myself lean
a moment, against the blue
shoulder of the air. The work
of my heart
is the work of the world’s heart.
There is no other art.

💨💨💨💨💨💨💨💨🌅💨
 
 There are prayers that God hears

That may not even noticed
by the one praying –
The eyes lifted in awe to a sunset. 
The beach comber picking up rocks as she grieves huge losses. 
The deep breath before entering the office of the abusive, power-hungry boss. 
The smell of your first cup of coffee. 
The watery laughter through brimming tears of the overwhelmed new mother. 
The patience of the store clerk doing his best with the impatient standing in line. 
The smiles of the people who know the secret of choosing to live life well. 
The accomplished weariness at the end of a good days work. 
The ride to home after 17 years of waiting. 
The beautiful silence of a couple sitting together holding hands. 
Candles burning in the darkness their shadows dancing on the walls. 
The smell of an old library. 
The many tastes of freedom. 
Sharing gifts with others because you know there is ALWAYS enough. 
Finding something special on the sidewalk. 

Waking up with someone to smile with. 
The list never ends – 
It’s why we are told to pray continually – 
Keep naming. 
Stay aware. 
Living as if everything is the miracle that it truly is –
Everything is grace. 
Our world is the spoken word of God,
we breathe the very breath of God which brought us to life,
and, as God said,
It is very good. 
 
AL 2/18/14

 My soul, wait silently for God alone, for my expectation is from him. Psalm 62:5
Our prayers lay the track down on which God’s power can come.      

 – Watchman Nee 
Listen to Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers sing It’ll All Work Out http://youtu.be/M_ftfh1z2Xc 
🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅🌅

photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

  

Sent from my iPhone

 

Posted in Adventure, attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, Change, Choice, connection, grace, Happiness, healing, Letting Go, Life, Love, mystery, soul and spirit, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
03 May 2015

draw me in…light me up

  CHARISMATIC PRESENCE

You really become aware of the force and light of human presence when you are in the company of a charismatic person. In theology, “charisma” means “divinely conferred favour.” A charismatic presence is one that inspires people. It has a natural balance between the personality and the vision that the person represents. In some way, the luminosity in the person is an aura that tangibly reaches out and affects others. In German one speaks of “eine grosse Ausstrahlung,” i.e., a great streaming forth of radiance. The charismatic person does have a radiance that stirs us. It is given to some people to be carriers of huge spirit. This is not something they have sought out or earned. It is not something that they have worked up in themselves. It seems to belong deeply in their nature. I remember once speaking to a friend about a family we both knew who had such spirit and he said, “If you put one of them in a house on her own, you would fill it.” Charisma reminds us that there is no system or frame large enough to hold the secret immensity that is in each person. — John O’Donohue, “Eternal Echoes”

  

   

   

listen to Neil Diamond sing Brother Love’s Traveling Salvation Show http://youtu.be/U5va1iaLj2M

😻😻😻😻😻😻😻

Photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

Posted in attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, beloved, Change, Choice, confidence, courage, strength, Trust, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
25 Apr 2015

we are all 

 We are challenged to love the unloveable
Do good to those who hate us
there is only one way to get this done –
To see myself as I am. 
It is what it is. 
I am the other. 
I am the unlovable. 
Only I know how much this is true,
full of lies and ego. 
I want to fight my way to the top,
crush those beneath. 
I want to do things my way. 
The earth to revolve around my desires. 
Under my self-pleasing ways,
I am afraid, 
because I know the truth. 
Yes, I am the unlovable
yet I am loved
I have experienced this love
and it has changed me,
at least parts of me,

I should say, 
It is changing me…
daily
I have been overwhelmed by grace,
drowned in the goodness of love,
resurrected in loves fire. 
It has allowed me to see my imperfections,
accept them,
even laugh at them 
and challenged me to
admit the truth,
to change,
to open,
to die,
to become vulnerable,
to love myself and
to love others,
who are the unlovable as well

Only love can mend a heart
only love can break it in two –
or into a million pieces,
then turn it to gold
in order to allow this love to flow through the broken and scarred,
to heal the world,

wounded healers all,
by sharing this same great love
this loves which loves us all
Yes, we are all the unlovable
yet we are loved,
just as we are. 
😈😇👿😇😈😇👿😇
ACL 8/28/13
 
photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513 

 

Posted in attitude, awareness, beloved, Change, courage, find art at pinterest, grace, Gratitude, Letting Go, Life, Love, soul and spirit, Trust, Vulnerability, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
20 Apr 2015

always return

 

 


When I was the stream, when I was the

forest, when I was still the field,

when I was every hoof, foot,

fin and wing, when I 

was the sky

itself,


no one ever asked me did I have a purpose, no one ever

wondered was there anything I might need,

for there was nothing

I could not

love.


It was when I left all we once were that 

the agony began, the fear and questions came,

and I wept, I wept. And tears

I had never known

before. 


So I returned to the river, I returned to 

the mountains. I asked for their hand in marriage again,

I begged—I begged to wed every object

and creature, 


and when they accepted,

God was ever present in my arms.

And He did not say,

“Where have you

been?” 


For then I knew my soul – every soul- has always held

Him. 

🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳🌳🌿

“When I Was the Forest” by Meister Eckhart 

🌳

 

Listen to Kari Jobe sing Be Still My Soul http://youtu.be/mq59iE3MhXM

photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513


 

 

Posted in attitude, awareness, beauty, Change, Choice, find art at pinterest, healing, Letting Go, Life, mystery, nature, Reflection, Relationships, soul and spirit, Trust, truth, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
16 Apr 2015

Can Broken Wings Fly?

 


Broken wings can fly?

Who will mend them/who will rend them?

Who will tend them/who will send them?

 

I have been on the road less traveled

And seen life and death unraveled

Torn and broken down;

And voices filled with gravel!

 

I have been in nothing more

And seen rapacious roar

And heard the unknown sound

Speaking loudly,

From the ground!

 

And through my eyes, through the hue

Ebbing ever from greed to blue

Sometimes blinded by the light

Rarely knowing what is right

I travel through the maze

And broken through the haze

 

But my heart has never broken!

It beats with never ending light

And I know not where it leads me,

But I know it leads to you!

In sky or in the sea,

Always spoken if not seen

Or seen if not spoken;

 

The vision never broken!

👐🏻👐🏻👐🏻👐🏻👐🏻👐🏻👐🏻

by Matthew Mele

 

 

 

 

 

listen to Paul McCartney sing Blackbird http://youtu.be/8ehhZ53zysQ

Photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513 

 

 

  

Posted in Adventure, attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, beloved, Change, Choice, confidence, courage, find art at pinterest, Gratitude, Growth, healing, Letting Go, Life, Love, Miracles, mystery, Poetry, power, Reflection, soul and spirit, strength, Thoughts, Trust, truth, Vulnerability, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
13 Apr 2015

Prayer

 

Bright Morning Star

God’s diamond brooch
Upon the blackest night
Whispering Hope
‘Neath mercy’s cloak,
“The dark is almost light!”
Waken, Slumber!
Sleep not past
The painted dawn for thee.  
Burst forth, O Star
One day not far
And shine Thy light on me. 
    – Beth Moore

   

 

  

I’m wandering through aisles in Barnes and Noble on Saturday. Wandering, wondering…hoping to find something I need to read, something to help me where I hurt and feel overwhelmed right now. I scan titles, can’t really focus, in the Christian aisle. I’ve read many of these books, nothing seems to be ‘it’ ugh. sigh. Surely I’m not past hope. 

Suddenly, I see this book. Beth Moore (love her) 10 weeks of Devotional Prayer. Ah. Prayer! THAT’S what I need right now. Intense prayer. Prayer. Changes. ME! 

I buy it, still in my fog. Sunday morning I will realize the name connection of this book, Whispers of Hope. My daughter, Krista, has just written a fictional, fantasy of her life story called, Whispers of Heaven. I bow in gratitude for these whispers speaking in my life, changing things, breathing hope in new ways. 

And so I begin this 10 week journey into prayer. Learning to love more deeply and truly, open myself more fully, praise, and praise more, all good things, communicate deeper with spirit, learning intimacy in new areas of trust and allow for life changing power to flow in and through me. 

 Listen to Jackie Velasquez On My Knees

http://youtu.be/bJwDxWddgSk

 

 

 

 

Posted in attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, beloved, Blessing, Change, Choice, Gratitude, inspiration, intimacy, Letting Go, Love, power, Prayer | Leave a comment
07 Apr 2015

every little things gonna be alright…

 

Spring Blessing

One day you wake up
able to name the weight 
you’ve been carrying.
Realizing it’s not part of your body or your being,
not essential in any way to journeying or joy,
you set it down gently, without fanfare
in the long soft grass at the side of the road
and walk on
surprised to find yourself
smiling in the warm sun
for no particular reason.

~Oriah Mountain Dreamer © 2015

  

Listen to Dinah Washington What A Difference A Day Makes http://youtu.be/OmBxVfQTuvI 

🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈❤️

photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

 

Posted in action, Adventure, awareness, Becoming Yourself, beloved, Change, Choice, courage, Faith, find art at pinterest, Growth, Happiness, healing, Joy, Letting Go, Life, Love, mystery, Patience, Relationships, soul and spirit, Trust, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
05 Apr 2015

and the sad things begin to be upended…      – Ann Voskamp

 

 When the cross hits your life, a loneliness, a blindness and a darkness come all around you. Darkness and lostness are the worst parts of suffering. The wonder of the Resurrection is that this darkness was opened out and at the heart of the darkness a secret light was discovered. Each one of us who has come here hasn’t come to this place out of curiosity but we have come because we know the need that is in our lives and we know the frailty that is in our hearts and minds. We are strangers in the world. In our journey through life anything can befall us. It seems to be very difficult for us as humans to learn how to love, to learn how the let the fear and the resentment and the blindness fall away from us and to come into the special joy and peace and freedom of love. No matter how assured or competent we may feel, there is none of us who has not large territories of fear in our hearts, fear of sharing ourselves, of opening ourselves, of entering life. That is why we come to an ancient holy place like this, before the dawn, to let the new tender light of the resurrection touch our helpless fear and transfigure it and open it into courage. 


~ John O’Donohue from his Easter Homily at Corcomroe Abbey 1992

 

Christ is risen!
Christ is risen indeed!

Crucified and risen Christ,
flood my heart with your light
and my soul with your living presence,
that I may trust the victory of God,
the victory of love over violence,
of life over death.
By your rising give me courage
to know that evil and oppression,
though they seem to reign,
have already been defeated.
You who bear me in your heart,
you have raised me up with you,
and set me free from my fear,
free from shame and despair,
free from all that would imprison me,
from all that would keep me 
from loving perfectly. 

Loving Christ, 
I have died in you and risen in you.
May I walk with courage
into this new life.
Amen.

__________________  
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light

www.unfoldinglight.net

 

 Listen to Sandi Patty sing Was It a Morning Like This? 

http://youtu.be/eb1ayV5sTtM

🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆

                                           Shake out your qualms. 
                                                Shake up your dreams. 
                                                Deepen your roots. 
                                                Extend your branches. 
                                                Trust deep water 
                                                and head for the open, 
                                                even if your vision 
                                                shipwrecks you. 
                                                Quit your addiction 
                                                to sneer and complain. 
                                                Open a lookout. 
                                                Dance on a brink. 
                                                Run with your wildfire. 
                                                You are closer to glory 
                                                leaping an abyss 
                                                than upholstering a rut. 
                                                Not dawdling. 
                                                Not doubting. 
                                                Intrepid all the way 
                                                Walk toward clarity. 
                                                At every crossroad 
                                                Be prepared 
                                                to bump into wonder. 
                                                Only love prevails. 
                                                En route to disaster 
                                                insist on canticles. 
                                                Lift your ineffable 
                                                out of the mundane. 
                                                Nothing perishes; 
                                                nothing survives; 
                                                everything transforms! 
                                                Honeymoon with Big Joy! 

Easter Exultet by James Broughton

🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆🔆

photo sources found at

www.pinterest.com/al513

 

Posted in attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, Change, Choice, courage, dark, Death, find art at pinterest, Glory, Gospel, grace, Gratitude, Happy Holiday!, healing, home, Hope, Letting Go, Life, Love, Miracles, mystery, Passion, Patience, power, soul and spirit, Today, touch, Trust, truth, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
02 Apr 2015

Where there is great love there are always miracles.     – Willa Cather

 

 For happiness

Unearthing what she is holding on to

Realizing fears that are not her own

Letting go of what she does not need

Making room for joy

 

The happier she is

The less she needs

 

The less she needs

The more room there is for happiness

 

It is not as easy as it sounds

To excavate her joy

To release fears that are not hers

To understand those that are

Then let go

Takes courage

Takes deep reflection

 

She has to remember

She has to accept

She has to take risks

 

For she lives in this world

Not in the yesterday

Not in the tomorrow

She has to live in today

 

Oh, deep in her heart she wants to make the best of it

Oh, deep in her soul she wants to be in love

Oh, deep in her mind she wants happiness

 

But

In order to decide what that is

She needs to get rid of the distractions

Remember what makes her happy

Find new joy

Explore new avenues

Seek new adventures

She needs to takes risks

 

Surrounded by what she is told

She must have

She must do

She must become

Gathering her courage

Gathering her thoughts

Gathering only that which she needs

 

She lets go of all that no longer serves her

Her home?

Her country?

Her way of life?

Her judgment?

Her perceptions?

Her conditioning?

What does she have?

 

Freedom

Freedom to think

Freedom to move

Freedom to start again

Freedom to learn

Freedom to create

All that she desires

Really

Truly

Simply

 

She becomes a pioneer of discovery

She takes risks

💃💃💃💃💃💃💃💃💃

A Woman On Purpose 

http://awomanonpurpose.tv/she-takes-risks/

 Watch Soul Suckers by Amos Lee 💞

 http://youtu.be/zqidM_U9rgU

💃💃💃💃💃💃💃💃💃

photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

Posted in Adventure, attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, beloved, Change, Choice, confidence, courage, create, Dancing, find art at pinterest, grace, Growth, healing, Letting Go, Life, Losing, Love, Miracles, People, soul and spirit, Trust, Vulnerability, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment

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