04.01.24. Seeing Beauty
“Blessed are they who see beautiful things in humble places where others see nothing.” – Camille Pissarro
Outside green is dotting the world, coming up through hard soft ground. rising up on bare brown twigs, peeking out from the decaying carpets on the forest grounds. This is the first rule of magic, seeing beauty where there seems none to be found. It is in the bleakness rubbing up against spring’s hope that allows us to see. To see the sky aching with longing for length and blue. To see the last breath of winter, exhaling its grip of long fallow and gray chains of gloom. To see the sugar ants arriving uninvited and now welcomed house guests along our kitchen floorboards. To see the red-pink stems of the peony pushing up through our garden debris. To see the yellow finch at our feeders singing his clear throated exuberant song of fluttering, wheezes and stutters. To hear the first slant of gold light flickering through our windows in tune with the robin’s 4 am call, welcoming dawn and spring to our doors. This is love and loss, sisters of the heart.
May we find beauty in the most humblest and the smallest of ways.
May it teach us its path of sight, simple, breathless-nothing beauty.
May we weep in its presence.
Today is Metta Monday
When: 2 pm
Where: 1765 Glenview Road, Glenview in the Patio Shops
Cost: No Fee. Donations and poems appreciated.
Where two or more are gathered something beautiful grows.
Love, Wini
PS. Gratitude pouring. raised enough funds to buy 5 meditation cushions! Thank you to all those that contributed-- your support helps those that attend Metta Monday to ‘take a good seat’ and ‘hold a posture of dignity and ease’. Thank you, thank you, I am so grateful.
Posted Below Warmth & Care for the Heart: 2 Poems. 3 Quotes. 2 Instagram. 1 Tedx Talk. 1 Song. 1 Book. 1 Interview.
🌸 Two Poems 🌸
THE POET THINKS ABOUT THE DONKEY | Mary Oliver
On the outskirts of Jerusalem
the donkey waited.
Not especially brave, or filled with understanding,
he stood and waited.
How horses, turned out into the meadow,
leap with delight!
How doves, released from their cages,
clatter away, splashed with sunlight.
But the donkey, tied to a tree as usual, waited.
Then he let himself be led away.
Then he let the stranger mount.
Never had he seen such crowds!
And I wonder if he at all imagined what was to happen.
Still, he was what he had always been: small, dark, obedient.
I hope, finally, he felt brave.
I hope, finally, he loved the man who rode so lightly upon him,
as he lifted one dusty hoof and stepped, as he had to, forward.
something about this poem, brings soft tears.
Maybe it is the donkey…and who does not know this feeling of – small, dark and obedient.
Or maybe it is the truth that effort is required, and at times bravery, to move forward, each day; putting one dusty hoof, step in front of another.
Or maybe it is the essential nature of the soul that knows each of us is called to a goodness and greatness that we may not even recognize by just being who we are, nothing fancy or special.
Saint Francis and the Sow | Galway Kinnell
The bud
stands for all things,
even for those things that don't flower,
for everything flowers, from within, of self-blessing;
though sometimes it is necessary
to reteach a thing its loveliness,
to put a hand on its brow
of the flower
and retell it in words and in touch
it is lovely
until it flowers again from within, of self-blessing;
as Saint Francis
put his hand on the creased forehead
of the sow, and told her in words and in touch
blessings of earth on the sow, and the sow
began remembering all down her thick length,
from the earthen snout all the way
through the fodder and slops to the spiritual curl of the
tail,
from the hard spininess spiked out from the spine
down through the great broken heart
to the sheer blue milken dreaminess spurting and
shuddering
from the fourteen teats into the fourteen mouths sucking
and blowing beneath them:
the long, perfect loveliness of sow.
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Three Quotes | John O'Donohue. Juliette Wood. Margaret Atwood.
“There is an unseen life that dreams us; it knows our true direction and destiny. We can trust ourselves more than we realize, and we need have no fear of change.” — John O’Donohue
“May you have the commitment to know what has hurt you, to allow it to come closer to you and, in the end, to become one with you.”– Juliette Wood, The Celtic Book of Living & Dying
“Sooner or later, I hate to break it to you, you're gonna die, so how do you fill in the space between here and there? It's yours. Seize your space.” ―Margaret Atwood
May you seize your space. Bloom in spite of fear. Commit whatever time you may have on this gorgeous planet and call back home all your brokenness into whole-holiness.
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Two Instagram Inspirations | Maya Angelou. Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo
The nobleness of the human spirit that awakens and rises, in spite of it all. Maya Angelou reading her poem, Still I Rise
Read. Posted in the comments: “...had the unbelievable experience to see her in action….We were at a restaurant in Georgetown & a young man was being disrespectful to a young woman at his table. Maya stood up & went over to their table & gave the young man a "talking too"!! It was Amazing & Beautiful & Dignified!! We were in a small intimate area of the restaurant & Everyone was quiet, watching this take place. We sat with reverence & a bit of intimidation brewing, as we wondered what she would do!?.... Once she said her peace, she asked the young man to confirm that he understood her words.... & then she gave a 1/2 smile & wished them a more pleasant rest of their evening! She walked back to her table, took her seat with her group & they resumed their meal & conversation..... The rest of us were a bit slower & more awkward resuming ours... having the knowledge that we had just witnessed greatness!!”
A short listen yet powerful teaching given by Tenzin Palmo that speaks to the core of being human which is that we are incredibly sensitive beings, and as human beings we tend to torture ourselves, hold onto criticism, the negative…
“...we should recognize that underneath people are really very delicate, our hearts are made of flesh not iron…”
A deeper dive into the negativity bias: The work of Dr Rick Hanson speaks about the brain having a built-in “negativity bias.” In effect, the brain is like Velcro for negative experiences, but Teflon for positive ones.
Powerful videos on his website to help overcome the negativity bias, and Tedx Talk here, Hardwiring Happiness: Dr. Rick Hanson
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One Book | Role to Soul by Connie Zweig
"The Inner Work of Age: Shifting from Role to Soul," which treats aging as a spiritual practice, and later in the program she shares highlights from her excellent book, "Meeting the Shadow on the Spiritual Path: The Dance of Darkness and Light in Our Search for Awakening."
In both books she extends her work on the shadow into midlife and beyond, and offers spiritual practices to use the circumstances of our aging to make an internal shift in identity -- from role to soul--from simply getting old to elderhood, from what we do to who we really are.
Several podcasts, youtube videos with Connie to listen and watch. Here is one here
“Burn away everything that is not Love.”
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🎶One Song | Deva Premal
The Heart Sutra (10:55) song by the glorious Deva Premal. Her album Love is Space was one of my most beloved CD’s (yes, that long ago…played on repeat, kept in my car, scratched and beloved.)
🌿It is said that this mantra calms all suffering.
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What Every Woman MUST KNOW to PREVENT Alzheimer’s | Neuroscientist Lisa Mosconi
A great listen. Important listen.
Rich Roll interview with Dr. Lisa Mosconi, an eminent neuroscientist specializing in women’s health.
She holds distinguished roles as an Associate Professor of Neuroscience in Neurology and Radiology at Weill Cornell Medicine. She serves as the Director of the Alzheimer’s Prevention Program at WCM/NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital.
Acknowledged by The Times as one of the 17 most influential female scientists, she’s heralded as the “Mona Lisa of Neuroscience” by ELLE International. Additionally, she is a New York Times bestselling author with works like The XX Brain and Brain Food. Continually reshaping our comprehension of brain health and aging, Dr. Mosconi imparts her latest insights in her insightful new book, The Menopause Brain.
🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸 Have a blessed day 💖 🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸
