life: acoustic & amplified
poetry, quotes & thoughts about life
Archive for the category “time”
Who is my neighbor?
“Love your neighbour as yourself” the Gospel says (Matthew 22:38). But who is my neighbor? We often respond to that question by saying: “My neighbours are all the people I am living with on this earth, especially the sick, the hungry, the dying, and all who are in need.” But this is not what Jesus says. When Jesus tells the story of the good Samaritan (see Luke 10:29-37) to answer the question “Who is my neighbour?” he ends the by asking: “Which, … do you think, proved himself a neighbor to the man who fell into the bandits’ hands?” The neighbour, Jesus makes clear, is not the poor man laying on the side of the street, stripped, beaten, and half dead, but the Samaritan who crossed the road, “bandaged his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them, … lifted him onto his own mount and took him to an inn and looked after him.” My neighbour is the one who crosses the road for me!
– Henri Nouwen
http://www.henrinouwen.org/
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Last week Ann Voskamp, and her son Caleb, were in Haiti for Compassion http://www.compassion.ca/child_list.asp read her blog posts about this experience http://www.aholyexperience.com/ – if you are not moved to action, you must be dead!
Check out the newest issue of my newsletter at www.songsfromthevalley.com – it is a very personal one. At the preent moment, I am in the middle of a big faith walk, so please pray for me today as God calls me to your mind.
I read Martin Luther King, Jr’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail yesterday and one sentence especially jumped out at me – ‘Actually, time itself is neutral; it can be used either destructively or constructively.’
What are we going to do with our time here? It is always our choice!
Wildflowers
Dark and early in your story someone fearful
of your inborn glory took it
and 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,
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.
Your 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.
______________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeou
s, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others. – Marianne Williamson
We are what we continually do – Aristotle
Habits Die Hard
I am your constant companion.
I am your greatest asset or heaviest burden.
I will push you up to success or down to disappointment.
I am at your command.
Half the things you do might just as well be turned over to me.
For I can do them quickly, correctly, and profitably.
I am easily managed; just be firm with me.
Those who are great, I have made great.
Those who are failures, I have made failures.
I am not a machine, though I work with the precision of a
machine and the intelligence of a person.
You can run me for profit, or you can run me for ruin.
Show me how you want it done. Educate me. Train me.
Lead me. Reward me.
And I will then…do it automatically.
I am your servant.
Who am I?
I am a habit.
by Mac Anderson & John J. Murphy / simpletruths.com
Stephen Covey, 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Rest in peace.
Habit 1: Be Proactive
Take initiative in life by realizing that your decisions (and how they align with life’s principles) 
are the primary determining factor for effectiveness in your life. Take responsibility for your choices and the consequences that follow.
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
Self-discover and clarify your deeply important character values and life goals. Envision the ideal characteristics for each of your various roles and relationships in life.
Habit 3: Put First Things First
Prioritize, plan, and execute your week’s tasks based on importance rather than urgency. Evaluate whether your efforts exemplify your desired character values, propel you toward goals, and enrich the roles and relationships that were elaborated in Habit 2.
Habit 4: Think Win-Win
Genuinely strive for mutually beneficial solutions or agreements in your relationships. Value and respect people by understanding a “win” for all is ultimately a better long-term resolution than if only one person in the situation had gotten his way.
Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood
Use empathic listening to be genuinely influenced by a person, which compels them to reciprocate the listening and take an open mind to being influenced by you. This creates an atmosphere of caring, respect, and positive problem solving.
Habit 6: Synergize
Combine the strengths of people through positive teamwork, so as to achieve goals no one person could have done alone. Get the best performance out of a group of people through encouraging meaningful contribution, and modeling inspirational and supportive leadership.
Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw
Balance and renew your resources, energy, and health to create a sustainable, long-term, effective lifestyle. It primarily emphasizes on exercise for physical renewal, prayer (mediation, yoga, etc.) and good reading for mental renewal. It also mentions service to the society for spiritual renewal.
7 Habits – repost from http://thedailylove.com/
friends with benches
Benches are special things aren’t they?
They themselves sit and rest, in the sun, in the shade, in the rain, in the snow, at three in the morning…
there to welcome whoever might pass by.
And for what purpose?
To give a soul a moment to rest, to look out, to think, to plan something, or to get over something.
And in their most special times, most special for these benches, are when two people meet and share themselves. Communicate and think more completely than they could or would if they were still walking.
Then after minutes or hours the people rise.
They are different forever because of those minutes, or hours.
Different in very minor ways most times I’m sure.
And at other times, profoundly changed.
They look back and the bench seems physically unchanged, but we know otherwise.
A person was there, moments after measurable warmth remains,
albeit slowly spreading out to be no longer measurable.
The world is different.
Relationships,
interconnections,
changes in perspective.
A reaffrimation of love in the broadest sense.
That maybe god did not make man in his image. That maybe man arrogantly makes god in his image.
God did not make only man,
and I don’t think everything else was made for only for man’s purpose.
Maybe what we find so beautiful and comforting is that nature,
the cosmos,
god,
free will,
the opportunities to do good or ignore other’s needs,
the choices to try and give more than we take,
or take all we can,
the always present capability to pursue happiness…
are all here as are we,
with a purpose we will always look for,
and never completely find,
and all of it as part of a whole incomprehensible to us.
Such joy possible just knowing we are so fortunate to be part of it.
God has no limits, none whatsoever.
On a bench,
realizing we are part of it all,
and always will be,
and sharing
that there is no necessity to understand it all.
– Sunny
have no fear…they are all God’s Particles
GOD PARTICLE
Last week they found the Higgs boson! For all you non-calculator-carrying mystical meditating un-geek poetry-reading hippie types, this is a really big deal.
When scientists came up with the math that explains how the physical universe holds together, they had a perfect equation, except for one thing. It explained a universe in which nothing had any mass—there was no substance. In order for things to have mass, there had to be one more factor, that they called the Higgs field, named for the guy who did the math. It’s a dimension of the physical universe that gives things mass when they interact with it. If it’s there, the math says, then there should be a tiny particle, called the Higgs boson. If they found that particle, it would prove almost everything. Trouble is, for 48 years, since it was predicted in 1964, nobody’s been able to find it. It’s been humorously called the “God particle”—not by scientists, but the popular media. In fact some scientists have suggested calling it—pardon the scientific jargon here—the Goddamn particle, for its elusiveness and the trouble and expense it has caused among those trying to find it. Until last week.
(Higgs Boson walks into a Catholic church. Priest says, “How dare you call yourself the God particle! Blasphemer! Get out!” Higgs Boson says: “Well, OK—but without me, you can’t have mass!”)
One thing I love about this whole thing is the “faith in something not seen” they had. Another is the sense of wonder. And another is the Higgs field. Present in all the universe, it gives things mass when they interact with it. Isn’t that sort of like God? God is present in all the universe, and when you interact with God, you are given substance. Nothing else gives you substance, not what happens to you, not what you do, not what others think of you. It’s God’s interaction with you. You aren’t responsible for the substance of your existence: it’s a gift from God. In a way youare a God particle, a tiny manifestation of the holy mystery that holds everything together.
So celebrate with the particle physicists. Like the Higgs boson, it turns out you’re more than just a figment of the world’s imagination. You’re proof of the existence of God.
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
don’t loose the simple definition: God is love
Yes, the people around us, and these lives we lead, are becoming more and more complex. There is no denying that the world is becoming a smaller and smaller place, as we have faster and faster means to get anywhere we want to go. Nothing seems to be very simple, yet at the root of everything in our lives, hearts, world is this one simple need: to feel loved and to give love – to be accepted and acknowledged for who we truly are.
Into that need comes our creator and He wants us to realize this truth: He IS love! We are His beloved! Pure and simple. He makes sure we all know – if we don’t have love, and live love – we have nothing. There is nothing else that is this important. Nothing else that is life changing and world shaking.
Today, sift through all your laters of complexity in your over-stimulated, over-scheduled, uber busy life and ‘turn up the quiet, cause love wants to dance’!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGTR7EOW31I&feature=youtube_gdata_player
life is made of days and moments
There are good days and bad days. We all have them. Why do some days flow better than others? We have our routines we follow most of the time, yet some days, things just don’t work. Some days are good hair days and some days we feel like we want to crawl out of our own skin.
It is our challenge to look for the good in our toughest moments. The days of car accidents, heels breaking, broken hearts or broken bodies. There is ALWAYS something good to find – IF we look for it. Our attitude is one of the few things in life we can control, it is the most important tool we have. When we decide we want a happy life – no matter what circumstance we find ourself in – we begin to make the choices that make that possible. A bad day, or moment, is not a bad life – do not let it derail you.
We are here for a limited time. What we do with that time matters. We have no guarantee of another day, or another moment. Ben Franklin said, ‘Do not waste time, for time is the stuff that life is made of.”
What if this moment is your last? How do you want to live it? Ok, do that! Still here? Yay!!! Take a deep breath, say a prayer of thanks and realize you are blessed to get the chance to do it again!
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Holly Gerth was a guest writer for Ann Voskamp yesterday – http://www.aholyexperience.com/
We’re made of where we’ve been, of who we’ve loved.
I’m standing in an hourglass. We all are.
I grasp each grain of sand for a second, feel it between my toes, tuck some of it into my heart.
Then I let it go with a smile and sigh.
Because that’s what it takes to be ready for the next bit of joy.
Open hands.
Open eyes.
Open hearts.
We all watch the sunset.
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Holley Gerth is the best-selling author of You’re Already Amazing. Check out www.holleygerth.com.
life: acoustic & amplified 
