life: acoustic & amplified

poetry, quotes & thoughts about life

Archive for the category “strength”

A Moment of Choice

Starting New

Starting something new allows us to choose to reset knowing that with each choice we learn, grow, and move forward.

There are times in our lives that lend themselves to starting something new. The beginning of a new year, finishing school, leaving a job, or changing homes—these all are times that turn our minds to fresh starts. Their advantage is that they bring with them the energy of that event, creating a tide of change around them that we can ride to our next shoreline. But we can choose to start anew anytime. In any moment we can decide that a bad day or a relationship that’s gotten off on the wrong foot can be started again. It is a mental shift that allows us to clean the slate and approach anything with fresh eyes, and we can make that choice at any time.

Starting new is most powerful when we focus our attention to what we are choosing to create. Giving all of our attention to the unwanted aspects of our lives allows what we resist to persist. We need to remember to leave enough room in the process of new beginnings to be kind to ourselves, because it takes time to become accustomed to anything new, no matter how much we like it. There is no need to get down on ourselves if we don’t reach our new goals instantly. Instead, we acknowledge the forward motion and choose to reset and start again, knowing that with each choice we learn, grow, and move forward.

Making the choice to start anew has its own energy—it’s a promise made to you. The forward momentum creates a sort of vacuum behind it, pulling toward you all you need to help you continue moving in your chosen direction. Once the journey has begun, it may take unexpected turns, but it never really ends. Like cycles in nature, there are periods of obvious growth and periods of dormancy that signal a time of waiting for the right moment to burst forth. Each time we choose to start anew we dedicate ourselves to becoming the best we are able to be.

www.dailyom.com

To know what you want, to understand why you’re doing it, to
dedicate every breath in your body to achieve… If you feel
you have something to give, if you feel that your particular
talent is worth developing, is worth caring for then there’s
nothing you can`t achieve.

– Kevin Spacey

There Are Woods

Where I lived there were woods

where I walked in contemplation

every morning and evening.

People asked when I moved,

Are there woods? Can you walk?

Yes, there are woods, deep and quiet,

where I walk in silence each day.

 

And if there weren’t,

there is still a stand of trees nearby,

where I could sit and listen.

And if they were gone,

there would be my back yard,

and a little garden,

and if there were no yard

I could still sit in this chair

and gaze out the window

at the neighbor’s trees.

And if there were no window,

no trees across the way,

if I could not walk

or gaze or see at all,

 

there are still these gentle woods

that stretch out forever,

deep and verdant, in my heart,

where I go every morning and evening,

and whenever I want,

in the quiet.

 

And so do You,

walking in the cool of the shade.

I know you’re here

by your great footprints

of silence.

This is what you shall do

by Walt Whitman

“This is what you shall do; Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body.”

“This is what you shall do…” by Walt Whitman, from the preface of Leaves of Grass. Public domain.

It couldn’t Be Done

Somebody said that it couldn’t be done,

But, he with a chuckle replied

That “maybe it couldn’t,” but he would be one

Who wouldn’t say so till he’d tried.

So he buckled right in with the trace of a grin

On his face. If he worried he hid it.

He started to sing as he tackled the thing

That couldn’t be done, and he did it.

 

Somebody scoffed: “Oh, you’ll never do that;

At least no one has done it”;

But he took off his coat and he took off his hat,

And the first thing we knew he’d begun it.

With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin,

Without any doubting or quiddit,

He started to sing as he tackled the thing

That couldn’t be done, and he did it.

 

There are thousands to tell you it cannot be done,

There are thousands to prophesy failure;

There are thousands to point out to you one by one,

The dangers that wait to assail you.

But just buckle it in with a bit of a grin,

Just take off your coat and go to it;

Just start to sing as you tackle the thing

That “couldn’t be done,” and you’ll do it.

 

– Edgar Albert Guest

Your Glory

Dark and early in your story

someone fearful of your inborn glory

buried it behind your house, and you,

innocently, and wise to save yourself

from their greater wrath,

believed its absence.

 

It’s not a pompous glory, ostentatious

or insistent on regard, but sure and quiet

as a wildflower’s, asking nothing.

 

And so you’ve lived—so have we all—

without it, your heart shoveled over

with self-doubt and apology, as if

you have no place or voice here

among angels.

 

We see you in the cripples who flocked

to Jesus, the mute, the paralyzed,

bent over, shut out, gone mad.

 

And all he meant to say was this:

you shine. You bring a gift

as no one else, and you belong.

Your Word deserves a hearing,

and this world needs your beauty

and your grace. There is no rank

you fall below, no worth you fail to match.

You shuttering was evil, and God

wants it undone, and wants you whole.

 

And so she takes you by the hand

and raises you to stand, to walk, to speak.

She listens to your song with joy.

She rains upon the earth

until you are unafraid of your radiance

and all our houses are surrounded by wildflowers.

used with permission

_____________________

Steve Garnaas-Holmes

Unfolding Light

www.unfoldinglight.net

from the very last section of the Course in Miracles – dictated to Helen

And now in all your doings be you blessed.

God turns to you for help to save the world.

Teacher of God, His thanks He offers you,

And all the world stands silent in the grace

You bring from Him. You are the Son He loves,

And it is given you to be the means

Through which His Voice is heard around the world,

To close all things of time; to end the sight

Of all things visible; and to undo

All things that change. Through you is ushered in

A world unseen, unheard, yet truly there.

Holy are you, and in your light the world

Reflects your holiness, for you are not

Alone and friendless. I give thanks for you,

And join your efforts on behalf of God,

Knowing they are on my behalf as well,

And for all those who walk to God with me.

AMEN

Dominance doesn’t equal strength

Just as how much money you have is an irrelevant measure of your true worth as a human being, dominance over others has very little to do with strength. Brute force, sure, but not strength. Not real strength.

Thomas Jefferson believed that strength emanated from union. From the ability to call upon the people and have them act, in unity, against tyranny, in favor of freedom.

http://www.howtomatter.com

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