courage | life: acoustic & amplified

Archive for the category “courage”

18 Jul 2015

water ditty’s

Sit and be still
until in the time

of no rain you hear

beneath the dry wind’s

commotion in the trees

the sound of flowing

water among the rocks,

a stream unheard before,

and you are where

breathing is prayer.

VI: Sabbaths 2001 [Sit and be still] by Wendell Berry

There is only one way, aging beauties,

to go down this river,

to hear the water’s music over the rocks,

to find a loving I, Thou, Who.

I say, spring out of the boat,

jump in naked, tender,

with your ferocious heart torn open.

💧💧💧💧💧💧💧💦

Hear the Water’s Music by Tere Sievers

Listen to Keb Mo sing I’ll Be Your Water http://youtu.be/jTvsHvd0Mkk

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16 Jul 2015

days of…

Days of wine and focus

of hanging on

of staying strong

of keeping faith

of sitting still

of being silent

of thinking in beautiful

of standing in my own shoes

of letting go

of loving you through the distance

of letting you lead

of feeling the passion

of attempting not to burn up

of recognizing the spectacular

of allowing the mystery

of hearing the call

of accepting what is

of not crossing borders or boundaries

of opening and opening

of trusting the journey

of seeing the face of God

of surrender into something bigger than I can know

of making the daily commitment

of acknowledging the grace

of thanking for everything

of looking for the miracles

of talking to trees

of taking time to prepare

of expressing my love

of helping in time of need

of following my own path

of obedience rather than selfishness

of love and love and love

of all things love
AL

Photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

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10 Jul 2015

letting go…always letting God

On this day of your life I believe God wants you to know…
…that tomorrow is the most important day of your life.
Your greatest moment, your greatest achievement, your

greatest adventure lies in the future, never in the past.

There is a new you waiting to be created tomorrow.

That is the joy and wonder of the dawn. That is the

excitement of it!

Forget about yesterday! What is the grandest version

of the greatest vision ever you held about

Who You Are going to be tomorrow?

That is the only question that matters.

💞

Neale Donald Walsh

I promised you that I would do it; and I will. However, it will be done in My way and in My timing. My way and My timing are often different than what you expect; but, they are perfect and they are right. My timing is always the best timing, and My way is higher than yours. I have told you that in My word many times.

You know only what you perceive and see, but I know every dimension of everything that is going on in your situation. I know the spiritual forces that are at work against you and what strategies they are taking. I know the things that you cannot anticipate, and they will not catch Me by surprise. My child, I take every one of these factors into consideration when I choose to work on your behalf and to bring My glory to your life.
I want you to know that I am always at work in your circumstances to turn them into My glory. Child, when you are in difficulty, I will make a way for you to escape. It may not be exactly what you expect, but it will be perfect, it will be for your good; and it will be just as I promised in My word.
I am holy. I am loving. I am the truth; and I am also faithful and trustworthy. It’s My desire for you to learn how trustworthy I am, so that you will put the full measure of your trust in Me. Don’t you know how much it blesses Me when you trust completely? So, the answer to your question is yes; I will do it. I will deliver you. However, it will be done in My way and in My time, and it will bring My glory into your life, just as I planned.

– Chosen One Ministries

Photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

Posted in attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, Blessing, Change, Choice, courage, determination, find art at pinterest, Freedom, healing, Letting Go, Life, Love, Trust, truth, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment

08 Jul 2015

soul listening

The intellect wants a summary meaning – all well and good for the purposeful nature of the mind. But the soul craves depth of reflection, many layers of meaning, nuances without end, references and allusions and prefigurations. All these enrich the texture of an image or story and please the soul by giving it much food for rumination. – Thomas Moore

You’ll know you’ve made the right decision when there is peace in your heart. Stop listening to what the world says you should do. Start listening to your own heart. There are only a few people in this world who will stay completely true to you, and YOU should be one of them. Listen to your own voice, your own soul, too many people listen to the noise of the world, instead of themselves. Deep inside, you know what you want, let no one decide that for you. — Unknown

Where does that singing start, you know,
that thin sound—almost pure light?

Not the birds at false dawn or their song

when morning comes, feathered throats

warm with meaning. A different kind of music.
Listen, it is somewhere near you.

In the heart, emptied of fear,

stubbornly in love

with itself at last, the old

desires a ruined chorus,

a radiant bloody choir.
Where does the singing start?

Here, where you are, there’s room

between your heartbeats,

as if everything you have ever been

begins, inside, to sing.

❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

A Summer’s Singing by Lorna Crozier

Listen to D. H. T. sing Listen to Your Heart http://youtu.be/C4HJ0zfZ-EM

❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

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04 Jul 2015

Happy 4th

I’m reading a book on hope

which sounds like I’ve taken up tatting

old fashioned and harmless
hope is unpopular

even Buddhists diss it telling us to live

in one awful moment at a time

and these days almost everyone wants to be a Buddhist
hope is hard to grasp when your imagination’s

grown fat on darkness

like the thick underside of a mushroom
tragedy is grand scale

predictably beautiful in its way

hope is hokey

imperfect full of stumbling little acts
the way a strand of neighbors standing in the rain

on the shoulder of Highway One American flags

in their hands and homemade signs:

Peace is Patriotic

can make another strand start up

even in the imagination
standing on a curve of the coast highway

where the land seems to fall away

into the open mouth of the ocean

their bodies like flags

waving sloppily

steadfast in the downpour

🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸
How to Hope by Katharine Harer – with thanks to Rebecca Solnit for her book, Hope in the Dark

💙❤️💙❤️💙❤️🇺🇸

Listen to Los Lobos/Grateful Dead sing This Land is Your Land http://youtu.be/zM18HENqNbk

❤️

But the day is past. The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epocha in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward, forevermore.

John Adams

July 03, 1776 to Abigail Adams

read full letter at http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/john-adams-to-abigail-adams-2/

Posted in America, Blessing, courage, Faith, Freedom, Gratitude, Happy Holiday!, Life, Peace, Respect | Leave a comment

03 Jul 2015

interesting conversations (grade: C-)

HAMLET: To be, or not to be–that is the question:

Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune

Or to take arms against a sea of troubles

And by opposing end them. To die, to sleep–

No more–and by a sleep to say we end

The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks

That flesh is heir to. ‘Tis a consummation

Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep–

To sleep–perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub,

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come

When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

Must give us pause. There’s the respect

That makes calamity of so long life.

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,

Th’ oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely

The pangs of despised love, the law’s delay,

The insolence of office, and the spurns

That patient merit of th’ unworthy takes,

When he himself might his quietus make

With a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear,

To grunt and sweat under a weary life,

But that the dread of something after death,

The undiscovered country, from whose bourn

No traveller returns, puzzles the will,

And makes us rather bear those ills we have

Than fly to others that we know not of?

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,

And thus the native hue of resolution

Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,

And enterprise of great pitch and moment

With this regard their currents turn awry

And lose the name of action. — Soft you now,

The fair Ophelia! — Nymph, in thy orisons

Be all my sins remembered.

🙀🙀🙀🙀🙀

I think of difficult days
Days I struggle to stay alive

To keep my head above water

To put one foot in front of the other

To stay hydrated in the middle of my water works
I think of days of joy

When everything sparkles

When I say hello to the bright-eyed me in the mirror

When I am so glad I’m alive

So connected to the whole
I think about the moods of nature

The sunny days

The gray days

Days of angry storms

or gentle raindrops

Days of extreme
Just like me

Extreme weather

caused by my energy

the energy around me

environmental and

relational factors
personal forecast

Todays weather calls for

Sunny outlook

with occasional clouds

a few showers through out the day

wine at sunset

moon full tonight

with a dream or two of your kisses

still warm on my lips

floating through

Waking to a great day tomorrow

until I see you again

😱😱😱😱😱😱😱

Listen to Amos Lee sing Soul Suckers http://youtu.be/zqidM_U9rgU

☔️☀️☔️☀️☔️☀️

photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

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02 Jul 2015

picture this

a photograph

a memory

a poem

a song

a kiss

a touch

a slap

a smile

a frown

a gift

a breath

a pause

a word –

of love or hate or truth or lie

all vivid pictures

memorials in a lifetime

of moments never to be forgotten

snapshots of a single frame in time

just a shutter-length

a stutter-length

an eye-lash blink

never to be here again –

yet never to be gone –

always within us

they live forever

we live forward

becoming the collective

of all these moments

as we grow

with each opportunity

we choose to become –

more or less –

we gain courage

we live with integrity

with truth.

or we remain hidden

afraid to let go of what’s gone.

we make these choices every instant we live –

every moment ours to decide:

to be,

or not to be?

yes, Mr. Shakespeare,

that, is still, the question.

Listen to Rosemary Clooney sing Sway http://youtu.be/eWI5tyS_sTg 😘😘😘😘😘😘😘😘😘😘

Top photo by Fisherman Dan @ Branford CT

bottom photo source @ www.pinterest.com/al513

💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙

There was nothing there when I heard a voice.

Haven’t you had a strangeness like this?

I did not respond right away, ignoring it,

and its restlessness increased.

I chucked it off as imagination.

Haven’t you ignored queasy feelings?

Perhaps it was from the empty fields,

but there was stillness in the grass and air.

This uneasiness followed me into the car

and went with me.

When stillness is so quiet, nothing is heard.

There was nothing in my house.

Nothing in the sky. Nothing in the isolated miles.

The voice persisted.

Ever ignore something that refused to be ignored?

It was telling me to enjoy and love.

The message was everywhere it needed to be.

All I had to do was listen—then it was everywhere.

💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙

When Stillness Is Heard by Martin Willitts, Jr.

Posted in attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Change, Choice, courage, Faith, inspiration, Letting Go, Life, Love, Passion, Relationships, touch, Trust, truth | Leave a comment

01 Jul 2015

nothing is worth more than this day!

Your life isn’t behind you; your memories are behind you. Your life is ALWAYS ahead of you. Today is a new day. Seize it! – Steve Maraboli

Listen to Frank Sinatra sing The Best Is Yet to Come http://youtu.be/TOyeyOEmFtE

🍒🍓🍎🍉🍊🍏🍑🍌🍇🍋🍐

Photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

Posted in attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, beloved, Choice, commitment, courage, determination, Faith, find art at pinterest, inspiration, intimacy, Letting Go, Life, Love, Passion, Patience, power, Relationships, soul and spirit, strength, Trust, truth, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment

30 Jun 2015

We must hold each other with tender care, so as not to bend a soul away from its truth. – from The Endless Practice

Over and over we break

open, we break and

we break and we open.

For a while, we try to fix

the vessel—as if

to be broken is bad.

As if with glue and tape

and a steady hand we

might bring things to perfect

again. As if they were ever

perfect. As if to be broken is not

also perfect. As if to be open

is not the path toward joy.
The vase that’s been shattered

and cracked will never

hold water. Eventually

it will leak. And at some

point, perhaps, we decide

that we’re done with picking

our flowers anyway, and no

longer need a place to contain them

We watch them grow just

as wildflowers do—unfenced,

unmanaged, blossoming only

when they’re ready—and mygod,

how beautiful they are amidst

the mounting pile of shards.

💐💐💐💐💐💐💐💐💐💐

The Way It Is by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

Listen to Norah Jones sing The Long Way Home http://youtu.be/tpeIePQpSuU

🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹

photo sources found at www.pinterest.com/al513

Posted in Adventure, awareness, Becoming Yourself, Change, Choice, commitment, confidence, courage, determination, find art at pinterest, healing, Letting Go, Life, Love, Passion, Patience, People, soul and spirit, Trust, Vulnerability, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment

28 Jun 2015

wonder unshackles us from the binding constraints of what we deem as possible, and it tickles us alive with the possibility of the impossible. – Craig D. Lounsbrough

The biggest lesson I’ve learned so far is, “It’s okay.” It’s okay for me to be kind to myself. It’s okay to be wrong. It’s okay to get mad. It’s okay to be flawed. It’s okay to be happy. It’s okay to move on.