life: acoustic & amplified

poetry, quotes & thoughts about life

Archive for the category “healing”

12 Oct 2015

do or do not

 

Death is not the biggest fear we have; our biggest fear is taking the risk to be alive and express what we really are. 

– Miguel Angel Ruiz

   Being present lets us experience each moment in our lives in a way that cannot be fully lived through memory or fantasy.

It can be easy for us to walk through the world and our lives without really being present. While dwelling on the past and living for the future are common pastimes, it is physically impossible to live anywhere but the present moment. We cannot step out our front door and take a left turn to May of last year, any more than we can take a right turn to December 2010. Nevertheless, we can easily miss the future we are waiting for as it becomes the now we are too busy to pay attention to. We then spend the rest of our time playing “catch up” to the moment that we just let pass by. During moments like these, it is important to remember that there is only Now. 

In order to feel more at home in the present moment, it is important to try to stay aware, open, and receptive. Being in the present moment requires our full attention so that we are fully awake to experience it. When we are fully present, our minds do not wander. We are focused on what is going on right now, rather than thinking about what just happened or worrying about what is going to happen next. Being present lets us experience each moment in our lives in a way that cannot be fully lived through memory or fantasy. 

When we begin to corral our attention into the present moment, it can be almost overwhelming to be here. There is a state of stillness that has to happen that can take some getting used to, and the mind chatter that so often gets us into our heads and out of the present moment doesn’t have as much to do. We may feel a lack of control because we aren’t busy planning our next move, assessing our current situation, or anticipating the future. Instead, being present requires that we be flexible, creative, attentive, and spontaneous. Each present moment is completely new, and nothing like it has happened or will ever happen again. As you move through your day, remember to stay present in each moment. In doing so, you will live your life without having to wait for the future or yearn for the past. Life happens to us when we happen to life in the Now. 

🔹

Daily Om

There is Only Now

Fresh and Unfixed

by Madisyn Taylor

   
THE SAFE PATH IS NOT ACTUALLY SAFE. Because what you might lose on the safe path is quite simply: everything. Everything that matters. Your individual essence, your treasure, your vitality, your purpose, your SELF. And that’s the most dangerous thing that can happen to you.

🔹

From Elizabeth Gilbert

🔹

photos found on facebook

Posted in action, Adventure, attitude, awareness, be, beloved, Change, Choice, commitment, connection, courage, create, determination, do, healing, Letting Go, Life, Love, Passion, Purpose | Leave a comment
11 Oct 2015

let it out

  
  
They Feel Your Love 

Artist Shawna Erback

❤️

Curiosity, creativity, discovery and wonder; they aren’t traits of youth, they’re traits of learning. If you want to feel younger and you want to replicate the conditions of youth, do that.  

      – Unknown  
Listen to Bellamy Brothers sing Let Your Love Flow   

💞

art found at http://www.pinterest.com

Posted in Adventure, attitude, awareness, Choice, connection, create, find art at pinterest, healing, Letting Go, light, Love, music, mystery | Leave a comment
10 Oct 2015

how do we ever ‘win’ in this world?

  
Do not hesitate to love and to love deeply. You might be afraid of the pain that deep love can cause. When those you love deeply reject you, leave you, or die, your heart will be broken. But that should not hold you back from loving deeply. The pain that comes from deep love makes your love even more fruitful. It is like a plow that breaks the ground to allow the seed to take root and grow into a strong plant.

   #HenriNouwen THE INNER VOICE OF LOVE

http://wp.henrinouwen.org/rgroup_blog/

  HEARTBREAK is unpreventable; the natural outcome of caring for people and things over which we have no control, of holding in our affections those who inevitably move beyond our line of sight. Heartbreak begins the moment we are asked to let go but cannot, in other words, it colors and inhabits and magnifies each and every day; heartbreak is not a visitation, but a path that human beings follow through even the most average life. Heartbreak is our indication of sincerity: in a love relationship, in a work, in trying to learn a musical instrument, in the attempt to shape a better more generous self. Heartbreak is the beautifully helpless side of love and affection and is just as much an essence and emblem of care as the spiritual athlete’s quick but abstract ability to let go. Heartbreak has its own way of inhabiting time and its own beautiful and trying patience in coming and going.

Heartbreak is inescapable; yet we use the word as if it only occurs when things have gone wrong: an unrequited love, a shattered dream, a child lost before their time. Heartbreak, we hope, is something we hope we can avoid; something to guard against, a chasm to be carefully looked for and then walked around; the hope is to find a way to place our feet where the elemental forces of life will keep us in the manner to which we want to be accustomed and which will also keep us from the losses that all other human beings have experienced without exception since the beginning of conscious time. But heartbreak may be the very essence of being human, of being on the journey from here to there, and of coming to care deeply for what we find along the way…
David Whyte

 

 Live today. Remove all blame from your vocabulary. Catch yourself when you find yourself using your past history as a reason for your failure to act today, and instead say, “I am free now to detach myself from what used to be”. – Dr Wayne Dyer

what is being responsible, truly?

what horrors do we shackle ourselves to in the name of responsibility?

how do we break the chains of control

of manipulation

of tradition

of condition

of religion?

and follow the the truth of our hearts 

of being in control 

of only our own lives

of our own destinies

of our souls true callings?

this is not about shirking our responsibility 

or being selfish

or leaving people in the lurch  

this is about coming from a place within

of being

of awareness

of beloved

of freedom

of disciplined action

seeing below the lying distractions so ready to keep us deluded

then allowing all things to flow from us 

to the ones we love

it’s the only way to truly live responsibly

in fact, it’s the only way to truly live

🔹

AL

  
photos found on facebook

Posted in attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, beloved, Change, Choice, commitment, compassion, connection, courage, determination, Faith, find art at pinterest, Freedom, healing, intimacy, Joy, Letting Go, Life, Love, People, power, Reflection, Relationships, Respect | Leave a comment
08 Oct 2015

love just is…there is no understanding why 

  
A man asked him, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments…” He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.” Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions. 

Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the realm of God!” And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the realm of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” They were greatly astounded and said to one another, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”

                  —Mark 10.17-27

💞

We continually have to resist the belief that there’s something we have to do to “be saved.” We think there are “good” people (the man thought Jesus was one) and others who are less so. We believe our salvation is up to us. Clearly the disciples think so. Were that true, of course it would be impossible. But it’s up to God. And God has already “saved” us.

Take note that Jesus looks at the man and loves him. The man does not need to do anything for Jesus to love him; he already does. He responds to the man not with requirements but with love. Because that’s his point. There is no requirement. God already loves us. We are already saved. There is no salvation beyond God’s love; God’s love is not insufficient for our eternal joy. All we need to be “saved” from is our own distrust. The man seems to have great possessions but “lacks one thing.” Jesus looks on him in his poverty and sets him free: let go of what you can measure and what you can lose—either riches or goodness—and grasp only what is infinite, what is already yours. 

Meditate on this infinite love of God. It is yours, now. It surrounds you, fills you, gives you every breath. You can’t deserve it more or less. It is simply here. Even as you ask and wonder, maybe even doubt, God looks at you with love. God’s delight is not up to you. Let this light break in, and become you.

__________________ 

Steve Garnaas-Holmes

Unfolding Light

http://www.unfoldinglight.net

  

As you start to walk on the way, the way appears.

~ Rumi

 

Photos found at www.pinterest.com 

Posted in attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, beloved, Choice, courage, determination, find art at pinterest, healing, inspiration, Letting Go, Life, Love, Miracles, People, Prayer, Relationships | Leave a comment
07 Oct 2015

a little help from our friends 

   
photos by Fisherman Dan @ Branford, CT

listen to Jack Johnson sing Upside Down http://youtu.be/dqUdI4AIDF0

🍁

If you stand at the edge of the forest 

and stare into it 

every tree at the edge will blow a little extra 

oxygen toward you 
It has been proven 

Leaves have admitted it 
The pines I have known 

have been especially candid 
One said 

that all breath in this world 

is roped together 
that breathing is 

the most ancient language

🔹

Ancient Language by Hannah Stephenson

  A bright gold canary diamond 

In the middle of a row of emeralds 

Light sparkles on brilliant color 

Natures jewels glimmering in sunlight 

Trees can’t help but be happy with who they are. 

Beloved 

Comfortable 

Extravagantly, audaciously beautiful 

Spectacularly themselves 

Totally at home where they’re planted 

Reaching for the sky 

Content to be rooted and grounded 

Letting their leaves come and go 

As they see fit 

watching all the dancing 

as seasons come and go. 

Knowing there will always be abundance 

Giving us life giving oxygen with, 

not even a whisper, 

of quid pro quo 

jealousy, 

or manipulation. 

Trees are magnificent. 

I can’t help but admire 

their character and integrity 

Their deep wisdom and acceptance of life. 

Their mystery and playfulness. 

Their understanding and gracious giving hearts. 

Even driving down the busiest of highways during rush hour 

becomes a beautiful experience 

when you spend the moments of the stop-n-go

looking out your car window 

at the show being put on 

right next to the roadway

🔹

AL

  
  

other photos found @ www.pinterest.com 

Posted in Adventure, attitude, awareness, beloved, Blessing, color, connection, find art at pinterest, Freedom, Gratitude, healing, Letting Go, Life, light, Love, Miracles, mystery, nature, Seasons | Leave a comment
05 Oct 2015

a friend loves at all times 

How will you know your real friends? Pain is as dear to them as life. A friend is like gold. Trouble is like fire. Pure gold delights in the fire.        ~ Rumi

  
And a woman spoke, saying, Tell us of Pain. 

And he said: 

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses 

       your understanding. 

Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its 

       heart may stand in the sun, so must you know 

       pain. 

And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily 

       miracles of your life, your pain would not seem 

       less wondrous than your joy; 

And you would accept the seasons of your heart, 

       even as you have always accepted the seasons

       that pass over your fields. 

And you would watch with serenity through the 

       winters of your grief. 
Much of your pain is self-chosen, 

It is the bitter potion by which the physician within 

       you heals your sick self. 

Therefore trust the physician, and drink his remedy 

       in silence and tranquility: 

For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by 

       the tender hand of the Unseen, 

And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has 

       been fashioned of the clay which the Potter has

       moistened with His own sacred tears. 

   – Kahlil Gibran: On Pain

   

 JOY

is a form of deep intentionality and self forgetting, the bodily alchemy of what lies inside us in communion with what formally seemed outside, but is now neither, but become a living frontier, a voice speaking between us and the world: dance, laughter, affection, skin touching skin, song, music in the kitchen: the sheer beauty of the world inhabited as an edge between what we previously thought was us and what we thought was other than us. 

Joy can be a practiced achievement not just the unlooked for passing act of grace arriving out of nowhere, joy is a measure of our relationship to death and our living with death, joy is the act of giving ourselves away, joy is practiced generosity. If joy is a deep form of love, it is also the raw engagement with the passing seasonality of existence, the fleeting presence of those we love going in and out of our lives, faces, voices, memory, aromas of the first spring day or a wood fire in winter, the last breath of a dying parent as they create that rare, raw, beautiful frontier between loving presence and a new and blossoming absence. 

To feel a full untrammeled joy is to walk through the doorway of fear, the dropping away of the anxious worried self felt itself like a death itself, a disappearance, a giving away, seen in the laughter of friendship, the vulnerability of happiness felt suddenly as a strength, a solace and a source, the claiming of our place in the living conversation, the sheer privilege of being in the presence of a mountain, a sky or a familiar face – I am here and you are here and together we make a world.

   – Joy by David Whyte

  
 

Listen to Andrew Gold sing Thank You for being a Friend http://youtu.be/Jzrq52qaXZI

photos found atwww.pinterest.com
  

Posted in Adventure, attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, beloved, Choice, courage, Encouragement, Faith, find art at pinterest, forgiveness, Freedom, friendship, healing, Life, Love | Leave a comment
04 Oct 2015

you can do this

 

 truth pursues me
through the cracks in the sidewalk

refusing to die

or lie

or be denied

like a lazy 

hazy

crazy

day

truth 

sometimes

dances with the breeze

tickling my face with feathers

at other times

hurricane winds blow me down

sucker punching me in the gut

like an invisible boxer

intent on one thing

opening my eyes

expanding my humanity

never leaving me to my own devices

stretching my souls edges

challenging my comfort zones

while making me ever-more-comfortable in my own skin 

allowing me to step, by baby step, 

another inch or two into the mystery of grace

one day I know I’ll fit

into the sparkly shoes 

I’m here to fill…

don’t worry…

you will too

🔹

AL

  
  
   
   
 
Photos found at www.pinterest.com 

Posted in attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, Beliefs, beloved, Change, Choice, commitment, confidence, connection, courage, create, determination, find art at pinterest, grace, healing, Life, perceptions, Reality, Reflection, Relationships, Respect, Seasons | Leave a comment
03 Oct 2015

what if?

 

 Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.
– Leo F. Buscaglia

   
 Job’s wife said to him, “Do you still persist in your integrity? Curse God, and die.” 
         

But he said to her, “You speak as any fool would speak. 
         

Shall we receive the good at the hand of God, and not receive the bad?”
                  —Job 2.9-10

   

      By the grace of God 
         

Christ tastes death for everyone’s sake.
                  —Hebrews 2.9

The question is not why there is suffering:
why shouldn’t there be?
Should there be no germs or earthquakes?

Should life be free of risk, or pain, or tears,
free of choices or freedom, but only directed by God?

Is pleasure always good, pain always bad?

Isn’t suffering necessary for love?

What would “deserving” be?

Would we want a God continually judging us,
the Dispenser Of Suffering And Reward?

Can God actually control suffering or pleasure?

Why is speaking in public, or being alone,
 heaven for one and hell for another?

A blind person I know rebuffs our sympathy:
what we call suffering she does not.

What if one experienced sickness not as suffering 
but a time to accept mortality, to draw near to God, 
a Sabbath?

Who “allows” evil or injustice, war or poverty? 
Who “allows” suffering when we eat meat? 

If a person suffered for their evil,
 could God not comfort them, relieve their sorrow or pain?

Or isn’t that the one thing God promises:
 not to make our lives exactly as pleasurable as we deserve
but to be with us in it all?

There is evil because we are imperfectly loved;
 sometimes we can’t bear our hurt, 
but project it onto others.

How does God deal with evil? 

By being with us in our pain, to heal it
 so we may stop spreading it.
 God suffers with us, “tastes death for everyone’s sake.”

There is no “reason,” nor need there be. 
There is no need for labels of “good” and “bad.”  
There is only gracious presence for all,
and the love that is willing to suffer for others,
 the saving grace of the cross.

Rather than question suffering,
 receive it as part of life, 
enter into people’s pain and the suffering of the world,
 and absorb it, so it may stop spreading —

and you will find God there.

 

__________________

 
Steve Garnaas-Holmes

Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

 

True love begins when nothing is looked for in return.

—Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

🔹

I want you to remember

I will always love you

Love does not forget

The sun will shine tomorrow

Don’t look back and regret 
Please won’t you remember 

rainy skies and grey days

Some times you will get

there’s always sun to follow

Then rainbows I predict 
I hope that you’ll remember

Love is really true

Sing and please don’t fret

The sun it shines, although 

you may not see it yet

🔹

AL

 

Listen to Little Anthony sing Tears on my Pillow  http://youtu.be/uxjQ3M_v7xc

🔹

photos found at www.pinterest.com

Posted in attitude, awareness, Beliefs, beloved, Change, Choice, compassion, courage, dark, Death, find art at pinterest, Gospel, grace, healing, Letting Go, Life, Love, Reflection | Leave a comment
02 Oct 2015

what matters most 

 THE ANCIENT DREAM

She has come to sense the inner world goes deep, indeed deeper than the wounds and breakages that others inflict. The contemplative has broken through to that sanctuary in the soul where love dwells. Crucial to this contemplative journey is the trust and imagination to realize that regardless of how you have been damaged, there is within you a sanctuary of deep love, trust and belonging. This is the ancient dream, the masterpiece of divine creativity: the creation of the human heart. Before time – back in the winter of nothingness and then all through the infinite springtime of evolution – the dream was the birth of an intimate well of kindness, care and love in the world, dwelling in the tabernacle of the human heart. 
🔹

John O’Donohue 

Excerpt from BEAUTY


 dear lord in this time of darkness
help us see the darkness
dear lord help us to not pretend

no more pretending
dear lord may our gaze be defenseless 

and unshardable 
teach us the piety of the open eye 
dear lord in this time of darkness

may we be unafraid to mourn and together and hugely
may dignity lose its scaffolding

faces crumble like bricks
dear lord let grief come to grief
and then o lord help us to see the bees yet in the lavender

the spokes of sunlight down through the oaks
and the sleep-opened face of the beloved

and the afternoon all around her 

and her small freckled hands

🔹

Prayer by Teddy Macker

 

Hearts out searching for a home
that one place where we belong

it’s a cold dark night here lately

but I have seen the light

home is your arms 

holding me tight
deeper and deeper into the beautiful 

waking my heart to sing this song

fly with me as flames grow higher

passion flaming deep desire

touching us on this dark night
There are times when life goes hazy

that place we all fall down

life can be so hard my baby

will you hold the line tonight?

open up your heart and fight 
we can do it together

love’s the place where dreams come true

we can make it together 

I believe we can make it

through 
there is hope in this moment 

there is hope in the sky

when days go dark and lonely baby

as long as stars are burning bright

there is hope

there is hope, ’cause

they burn for you

oh baby 

we can make it through

🔹

AL

Listen to Time of the Season by The Zombies http://youtu.be/wG5R7vyu-mA

 

photos found at www.pinterest.com 

Posted in attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, beloved, Change, Choice, commitment, compassion, courage, Encouragement, Faith, find art at pinterest, friendship, healing, Letting Go, Life, Lonely, Love, mystery, Passion, Peace, People, Prayer, Reflection, soul and spirit, touch, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
30 Sep 2015

higher ground 

 

    
  

 

            It’s an interesting

custom, involving such in-

            visible items as the food

that’s not on the table, the clothes

            that are not on the back

the radio whose only music

            is silence. Doing without

is a great protector of reputations

            since all places one cannot go

are fabulous, and only the rare and

            enlightened plowman in his field

or on his mountain does not overrate

            what he does not or cannot have.

Saluting through their windows

            of cathedral glass those restaurants

we must not enter (unless like

            burglars we become subject to

arrest) we greet with our twinkling

            eyes the faces of others who do

without, the lady with the

            fishing pole and the man who looks

amused to have discovered on a walk

            another piece of firewood.

🔹

Doing Without by David Ray

   
photos found on http://www.pinterest.com

Listen to Sara Bareilles sing Between the Lines http://youtu.be/s8e45WHIduM

Posted in action, attitude, awareness, beloved, Blessing, Change, Choice, commitment, connection, courage, determination, Faith, Glory, Gratitude, Growth, healing, Letting Go, Life, Love, perceptions, Reflection, Relationships, soul and spirit, strength, Trust, truth, Uncategorized, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment

Post Navigation

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →