life: acoustic & amplified

poetry, quotes & thoughts about life

Archive for the category “power”

17 Apr 2016

again and again

  
This world doesn’t improve by demanding perfection. It improves when we reach through our armor and touch another with tenderness. It improves when we bust through the walls of our conditioning, and try a new way of being on for size. It improves when we work through our unresolved shadow and share what little light we can find. It is the small, positive steps that we take when we are at war with ourselves that change the world.

   – Jeff Brown 

awe…

examination…

it keeps appearing 

again…

I delete…

and again…

I delete…

and again

haven’t I already written this poem?

haven’t I already done that before?

What is left…

that I don’t know…

that I haven’t taken out…

haven’t examined properly?

There are always more layers

An onion…revealing more onion

layers…

upon layers…

illusions,

shadows,

truth left to excavate,

healing to be won,

motivations to uncover,

mystery to be discovered,

always more. 

God keeps getting bigger

as I examine,

I reduce,

I open. 

help me to stay in this mode of learning…

growth…

humble me…

soften me…

my best self emerges within this process

send it again…

remind me again…

💞

AL

   
 
  

Posted in attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, beloved, Change, Choice, connection, courage, find art at pinterest, healing, inspiration, intimacy, Letting Go, Love, mystery, Patience, power, Prayer | Leave a comment
12 Apr 2016

them bones… them dry dry bones

  
Around 15 years ago now

I took a business trip 

Somewhere in the middle of Florida

I was hostess for a community meeting

to talk about a new electrical line route and sub-station 

proposed for this area

by the electric company I worked for at the time

I was with a team 

We stayed in a local bed and breakfast

I had breakfast with a married couple 

from somewhere west of Orlando,

can’t remember the town,

who were prophets of God. 

Don’t ask me how I know,

I just do. 

I was still learning to open to mystery

(my fundamental Baptist background 

was being constantly challenged)

and I was early in my ‘testing’ to find out if God was really real,

I was early in my healing from the abuse, 

shattering and loss I had gone through in the past years of my life. 

Then, somehow, this couple and I were alone together –

the rest of the team out checking out the project route. 

I ended up in their room.

I told them some of my story. 

I sang for them. 

They prayed over me,

anointed me with oil,

proclaimed and prophesied my future. 

They wrote prophesy down on paper,

then burned it in the fireplace. 

It was all a little weird and surreal,

more than a little scary,

and yet I knew they were sent there, 

at that very place and time,

because God sent them there for me. 

I do not know their names,

I never saw them again,

the business card they left me had a number which was not active – 

Curiosity made me call that number a few weeks later. 

Number not in service. 

I never told anyone about this. 

It was a very strange episode I kinda ignored. 

I’ve never spoken, or written, about it since,

until now,

all these years later. 

It keeps coming back to me lately,

since I recently spent an unexpected evening with 

one of those project team members I was traveling with on that fateful trip.

I still don’t understand it,

but I am grateful,

I realize how far God’s grace has lead me 

since the day of my unexpected, mysterious, anointing. 

❣

AL

  
  
  

Posted in awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, beloved, courage, find art at pinterest, Impossible, intimacy, Letting Go, Life, Love, Miracles, mystery, Poetry, power | Leave a comment
25 Mar 2016

Good Friday 

 

 Copperleaf Lane is dancing in white,
like a row of brides,

as ready, 

as they possibly could be 

to say, I do. 

I drive through the flower strewn pathway

feeling special,

like life is unfolding,

just for the love of me.  

I am beloved, 

a daughter of graces,

twirling within this beauty,

this bounty,

the world’s abundance falling freely around me. 

I sing,

la dee da dee da

You keep filling my senses,

you keep walking towards me,

smiling,

that beautiful heart of yours,

held gently, 

tenderly,

within your hands –

the perfect gift

for a girl like me. 

Heaven is holding its breath…

counting intensely…

1…

2..
❤️

AL

  
  
TURNING TOWARD HOME 
The moment you have spoken the exact words that describe your distance from where you want to be, the moment you have uttered the exact aching dimensionality of your own exile, you have already turned around, faced the other way and taken the first steps on the long awaited journey home… 

🌳

David Whyte

THE THREE MARRIAGES

Re-imagining Work, Self and Relationship

   yesterday I was born a leaf

a small fragile tender wisp

trembling as I hung on the vine

yesterday I was a gust of air

short lived, but not insignificant 

full of bone rattling cold and hat disturbing bravado

yesterday I was a large, slow, snow flake

plopping down like a wet goose feather

making the world a magical place

yesterday I was a world made of glass

lying shattered on the floor

hoping to be recycled into a new and useful object

yesterday I was various people

a student, a host, a friend, a lover

feeling my way into the next moment hoping to find a way home

yesterday I stood tall as a tree

proud yet with humble confidence 

accepting what winter brought, gently weeping, 

embracing this brand new life bringing

spring

🌿

AL
 

here’s the thing…

what’s a girl to do with all this happiness?

what sort of containers can hold this amount of wild joy?

will howling at the moon help disperse it into the world?

or dancing in a beautiful fountain, with you, bring sanity?

what if I shout it proud to everyone I pass on street? 

will they clap to hear my good news? 

will you wish me happy for every morning and evening? 

will you take a train, plane or automobile to see me? 

will you hold me & tell me that I’m the most beautiful girl you’ve ever seen?

will you love me with all you are for everything I am right now,

and ever will be becoming?

living well is my best revenge

won’t it would be nice to share this happiness? 

do wild and crazy things?

come on, everybody,

let’s let joy flow in big puddles all around us,

till we jump like children,

till we swim in the ocean of all this blessed grace

🌫

AL

Posted in attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, beloved, Blessing, connection, Faith, find art at pinterest, giving, Glory, grace, Gratitude, Happiness, Happy Holiday!, healing, Letting Go, Life, Love, Miracles, mystery, Passion, Patience, power, Prayer | Leave a comment
05 Mar 2016

take a breath

  
In these times when anger

 Is turned into anxiety

 And someone has stolen

 The horizons and mountains,
Our small emperors on parade

 Never expect our indifference

 To disturb their nakedness. 
They keep their heads down

 And their eyes gleam with reflection

 From aluminum economic ground,
The media wraps everything 

 In a cellophane of sound,

 And the ghost surface of the virtual

 Overlays the breathing earth. 
The industry of distraction

 Makes us forget

 That we live in a universe. 
We have become converts

 To the religion of stress

 And its deity of progress;
That we may have courage

 To turn aside from it all

 And come to kneel down before the poor,

 To discover what we must do,

 How to turn anxiety

 Back into anger,

 How to find our way home. 

🏡

John O’Donohue 
‘For Citizenship’ from BENEDICTUS

  

Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does.         – Jean-Paul Sartre

  
photo sources at http://www.pinterest.com

Posted in America, anger, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, Beliefs, Career, Choice, compassion, confidence, connection, courage, Encouragement, find art at pinterest, Freedom, Hope, Imagine, Life, Peace, politics, power, Reality | Leave a comment
18 Feb 2016
2 Comments

When we walk on the earth with reverence, beauty will decide to trust us.   – John O’Donohue

  
love warriors walk through this world

love dripping from open hands

falling onto shattered pieces of the broken 

staining bits of the kaleidoscope of hearts

stepping carefully

slowing down

as the ones who have forgotten to know

appear to do battle

not knowing what they have forgotten…

we are all the light

we are each the beloved..

please let me hold you

touch those wounded places

rub love on the sore spots

until you remember

what you already know

stay here with me 

for a long long while

let’s walk together

connecting 

hands

hearts

love

as we go

allowing the drip to become 

a pour

a fountain 

a river

an ocean

as we sail our sea green ship

into this mystic world beyond the stars 

beyond the moon

and once again

find ourselves home in the sun

☀️

AL

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

🌙

At the heart of things is a secret law of balance and when our approach is respectful, sensitive and worthy, gifts of healing, challenge and creativity open to us. A gracious approach is the key that unlocks the treasure of encounter. The way we are present to each other is frequently superficial. We become more interested in ‘connection’ rather than communion. In many areas of our lives the rich potential of friendship and love remains out of our reach because we push towards ‘connection.’ When we deaden our own depths, we cannot strike a resonance in those we meet or in the work we do. A reverence of approach awakens depth and enables us to be truly present where we are. When we approach with reverence great things decide to approach us. Our real life comes to the surface and its light awakens the concealed beauty of things. When we walk on the earth with reverence, beauty will decide to trust us. The rushed heart and the arrogant mind lack the gentleness and patience to enter that embrace. Beauty is mysterious, a slow presence who waits for the ready, expectant heart. 

💖

 John O’Donohue 

 Excerpt from BEAUTY

 

photo by Fisherman Dan @ Branford, CT 

Posted in action, attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, beloved, Choice, commitment, compassion, courage, determination, Encouragement, Faith, find art at pinterest, Letting Go, Life, light, Love, Poetry, power, Prayer
09 Feb 2016

doxology and dreams in the dark   

 

 When I looked for good, then evil came unto me: and when I waited for light, there came darkness. 
– Job 30:26 


Smack dab in the middle of the fight 

While I waited for right 

my day turned to night 
I thought I was fine 

the good I would find 

then early one morning I found I was blind
I lay on the ground 

this dark hell I found 

fluttering wings the only sound 
I drank this dark brew 

no way out but through 

this darkness just grew and grew
Overtaking me, Helpless I turned 

My hope was all burned 

I could not choose what I thought I had earned 
I lay in Your hand 

in Your arc I did land 

trusting the truth I had already found 
Watching life pass 

going ever so fast 

oh how long will this dark, dark night last? 
In spite of the fear 

I am still here 

I give thanks even through tears 
I trust in Your plan 

My life is just sand

I am a follower and not a just fan
and if I should die 

The truth does not lie 

The sun will still be here when I say goodbye

I trust in the way

I open and say

Come open the door today
So light come and hold me 

Love come, grow boldly 

Till every bush, and bud, flames holy 

🌙

AL 

    
 

   

Posted in attitude, awareness, beauty, Becoming Yourself, beloved, Change, Choice, commitment, confidence, connection, create, dark, Death, find art at pinterest, forgiveness, Glory, Gospel, grace, Grieving, Letting Go, Life, Love, Miracles, Poetry, power, Purpose, Reality | Leave a comment
29 Jan 2016

power

   
    
    
    
    
 
If you ever doubt the power of language, listen more closely. Witness the magic the first time someone whispers “i love you.” Watch a woman put on head phones, close her eyes, and have her life changed by a lyric. See a bad moment flipped upside down by a well timed joke. Words propel us, empower us, make us human and more than human. We constantly struggle to say what we mean and mean what we say. To “wrestle with words and meanings.” that’s what t.s. eliot calls it. But as we whisper and shout, stutter and spin, we create order out of the chaos around us. We are built of words, and we live by them, too.

💌

    -Hallmark

  

Posted in attitude, awareness, Letting Go, Life, Love, Miracles, People, power, Relationships, soul and spirit, Vulnerability, www.pinterest.com | Leave a comment
22 Jan 2016

everyday hero

  
Quote of the Day: Virtue 
Next to the seven deadly sins, the seven cardinal virtues are apt to look pale and unenterprising, but appearances are notoriously untrustworthy.
Prudence and temperance, taken separately, may not be apt to get you to your feet cheering, but when they go together, as they almost always do, that’s a different matter. The chain smoker or the junkie, for instance, who exemplifies both by managing to kick the habit, can very well have you throwing your hat in the air, especially if it happens to be somebody whom for personal reasons you’d like to have around a few years longer. And the courage involved isn’t likely to leave you cold either. Often it’s the habit kicker’s variety that seems the most courageous.
If you think of justice as sitting blindfolded with a scale in her hand, you may have to stifle a yawn, but if you think of a black judge acquitting a white racist of a false murder charge, it can give you gooseflesh.
The faith of a child taking your hand in the night is as moving as the faith of Mother Teresa among the untouchables, or Bernadette facing the skeptics at Lourdes, or Abraham, age seventy-five, packing up his bags for the Promised Land. And hope is the glimmer on the horizon that keeps faith plugging forward, of course, the wings that keep it more or less in the air.
Maybe it’s only love that turns things around and makes the seven deadly sins be the ones to look pale and unenterprising for a change. Greed, gluttony, lust, envy, and pride are no more than sad efforts to fill the empty place where love belongs, and anger and sloth just two things that may happen when you find that not even all seven of them at their deadliest ever can.

 ⚜

~ Frederick Bruechner originally published in Whistling in the Dark and later in Beyond Words

 

   

 

  

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

Posted in action, attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, beloved, Change, Choice, commitment, connection, determination, Dreams, find art at pinterest, forgiveness, Freedom, Growth, Habits, Happiness, healing, Hope, Imagine, Impossible, inspiration, Joy, Letting Go, Life, Love, Miracles, mystery, Passion, Patience, Peace, power | Leave a comment
09 Jan 2016

what do you want?

I keep

learning…

 

 Whatever we learn to do, we learn by actually doing it; men come to be builders, for instance, by building, and harp players by playing the harp. In the same way, by doing just acts we come to be just; by doing self-controlled acts, we come to be self-controlled; and by doing brave acts, we become brave……
🔹

 Aristotle

   

   

   

  

   

   

   

Posted in action, attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, confidence, courage, determination, Dreams, focus, Passion, Patience, power, Purpose, strength | Leave a comment
04 Jan 2016

just for today

  
It took me some years to understand that many of us are more afraid of happiness than misery. Because misery and martyrdom have an inherent safety about them- one is never particularly vulnerable, nor at risk of disappointment. Unhappiness becomes a security blanket, a way to armor ourselves against deep feeling. On the other hand, happiness has an intrinsically risky quality. When we open our hearts to life, we are always vulnerable to loss, to shattering, to having it all fall away. But it can also expand and deepen, joyfully permeating every element of our life. I can often sense when someone has made unhappiness their shield, their perpetual life stance. And it saddens me. Because locking ourselves into only one way of being is a self-fulfilling prophecy: misery begets misery. Because only through risking something can we arrive at a new perspective. And most significantly, because the rhythms and tides of one’s life can shift in the blink of an eye. All it takes is one sunny day and the whole damn thing can come back to light.

    – Jeff Brown

 

   

  

Posted in anger, attitude, awareness, Becoming Yourself, Beginning, Change, Choice, commitment, determination, do, Encouragement, find art at pinterest, Happiness, inspiration, Love, power, Relationships | Leave a comment

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