In this corner of the world, nature is waking up with a stifled, slightly embarrassed yawn. Winter has overslept its welcome and the ground is buzzing with the stretch of new greenery while tiny fists have pushed out of the barest of branches overnight. A tip of the hat to the tip of the clock for yesterday was the Spring Equinox.
And with it energy is spiraling up through my brain like vines climbing beyond the roof. My thoughts are spinning, swinging from one puffed up cloud to the next on a verbal trapeze, uncatchable. While at times that makes me smile at the folly, I also feel strongly the need to focus towards something centered at the root.
Do you have a meditation practice? I have always danced around one, just as I have with my pick and choose spiritual beliefs. But at this time in my life, it seems like the biggest gift that I can give myself, along with healthy doses of self-care and kindness. So I am taking a cross-legged seat, closing my eyes and focusing on my breath, that greatest of gifts, never to be taken for granted.
My mind will only calm for mere moments and so I listen to Jack Kornfield‘s instruction to treat those rollicking ideas as I would teach a puppy to stay, gently. Over and over, I come back to just being. At times that feels like it is all that I do. Start over, start over…reconnect. But it is wonderful to be able to peak around a new corner with a taste of hope untarnished in my mouth…
…so ripe for this time of year, here…and now. A beginning.
As today is World Poetry Day (thank you, Edgar!),
I thought that I might share a poem that I keep coming back to from Mary Oliver’s new collection called Felicity:
The World I Live In
I have refused to live
locked in the orderly house of
reasons and proofs.
The world I live in and believe in
is wider than that. And anyway,
what’s wrong with Maybe?
You wouldn’t believe what once or
twice I have seen. I’ll just
tell you this:
only if there are angels in your head will you
ever, possibly, see one.
Whether you are winding up or down, please know that I am sending my best thoughts to you as we enter another season, one ripe with opportunities.
Thank you for being here,
Heather
It is true, Loree, it is so different for you. I understand that. We had such a brutal summer last year but for you it is like that every year, I think. But yet, I always love your quiet posts during the heat – that is selfish of me, I guess!
Oh Dani, I am so excited that you are even considering doing so! And fear, worry and anxiety are exactly the reasons why I am trying to develop a practice, so I am right there with you.
Sending good energy to you…xo
very upset about Brussels. Reading "War and peace", nothing changed but the trees are still blooming
I just love these rigid buildings juxtaposed with the fluidity of meditation and belief…it can be such a struggle to balance the two. Somehow you seemed to do it in this post. So glad to hear you're meditating, and remember that meditation in itself is fluid too, whether lying, sitting, listening to music or weeding the lawn. Wishing you clarity and peace this spring:)
Spring hit my part of Southern California over a month ago – purple French lilacs, white flowering pears and deep blue rosemary have been in full bloom since mid February. However, as if on cue for March 20th – Sunday morning I noticed that the roses, Rose-scented Geraniums, and Cistus (Rockroses) have suddenly burst into bloom.
Gardening with classical instrumental music or church music is my meditation. I also commune with God in my Garden which seems appropriate since life began in a Garden.
AND, Reason and Logic can happily co-exist with "what-ifs?" We would have no scientific advances or any kind of advances for that matter, if some one did not wonder about "what if?" Logic and reason simply confirm that the "what if?" is true so the next generation of thinkers can build upon that truth.
Spring time has always been the season for renewal. Printemps is related to the words prime and time meaning first time or first season of the year.
Bonjour Printemps!
Charlotte
Oh I have such a hard time shutting off the monkey mind. Usually my mantra turns into "shut up shut up shut up" which seems, somehow, wrong for a meditation practice. I find knitting to be meditative, the repeating motions, the going back and forth…sort of like the swimming I used to do…I would let it all out in the pool…and just leave it there.
and I love the idea of a day for poetry. Especially in these terrible times, I keep thinking about this one:
The Peace of Wild Things by Wendell Berry
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Just lovely! Happy Spring!
This is pure poetry…the way those vines climb the walls <3
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Yes, in fact Spring is coming also this year and it always seems like a little wonder to me. Nature provides these wonders for us despite all the terror that is just happening again. Today may be a good day for a run in the vineyards but a very bad one if one had started that journey from Brussels.
Now, you see it happened again, I wanted to write something positive about a new beginning and end up writing about terror.
Though Spring is still a wee bit further away here than it already is in the South of France (I saw 17C yesterday), I am visiting everyday my Clematis on my balcony that is already pushing and shows strong signs of growth. Thats my meditation practice.(And going to the woods, though only municipal, listening to the birds…(;
I wish you a wonderful Spring dear Heather!!!