Archive for the ‘Life’ Category
Let Love Show You the Way
Monday, February 4th, 2019
Sometimes we just need to listen.
Sometimes we just need the quiet.
Sometimes we just need to reflect.
Sometimes we just need to be alone.
Sometimes we just need to be with by friends.
Sometimes we need to lead.
Sometimes we need to follow.
And sometimes, actually most times, we need to let love show us the way.
Return of the Light
Friday, December 21st, 2018
2018 has been a tough year for me and my family. My dad was ill for most of the year and passed away in September. My sisters and I spent a lot of time with him making sure he had good care and spending every possible moment we could with him. We all miss him terribly and the darkness of the season is felt deep within each of us. We have spent this year nurturing, worrying, grieving, and longing. The darkness of the season has felt long.
And yet, there is a promise of light – a Winter Solstice. There is a reminder that we grow in the darkness. We feel hope in the unknown. And we return to the light. Each day will grow longer, and those long dark nights will grow shorter.
Perhaps we will feel the return of the light. It will take time. We will feel our dad’s light within us – the joy and love and humor he shared with everyone he met. His story, and our story will carry on because we carry him in our hearts. It is the most primordial feeling there is – love. And that love becomes our primordial light.
As Alberto Villoldo shares, “Primordial Light is the creative power of the Universe which is available to us to create beauty in the world, and to heal ourselves and others. But to work with Primordial Light we must remember the way of the luminous warrior. We must live and act fearlessly, know the answer to “Who am I?” and the ways beyond death into infinity.”
The path towards light always begins in the dark. It’s how seeds grow. It’s how we grow.
The Solstice is a reminder that light emerges out of darkness. The most holy darkness is the deepest darkness.
May we fully emerge out the darkness into a greater light for all to feel.
Happy Solstice.
This is dedicated to my beloved sisters, Kathleen and Dawn. They are bright lights in the world.
Echoes of a Grieving Heart
Saturday, October 13th, 2018
Thoughts swirl after grief. None of them seem real or capture the essence of loss. Sometimes I look for words from other people to help give language to the grief that lives inside my heart. One author who captures grief brilliantly is Joan Didion. In her books, The Year of Magical Thinking and Blue Nights, Didion writes about her experiences of grief and the echoes of aches it leaves behind. Each line feels like a deep meditation of the heart.
Was it only by dreaming or writing that I could find out what I thought?
In time of trouble, I had been trained since childhood, read, learn, work it up, go to the literature. Information was control. Given that grief remained the most general of afflictions its literature seemed remarkably spare.
That I was only beginning the process of mourning did not occur to me. Until now, I had only been able to grieve, not mourn. Grief was passive. Grief happened. Mourning, the act of dealing with grief, required attention.
Grief turns out to be a place none of us know until we reach it. We anticipate (we know) that someone close to us could die, but we do not look beyond the few days or weeks that immediately follow such an imagined death.
You have to pick the places you don’t walk away from.
To my beloved dad—I miss you everyday.
From Struggle to Strength
Thursday, May 10th, 2018
This poem was submitted as part of National Poetry month. It is written by 15-year-old, George Ferguson. It fits into all that Toning the OM represents: mind and body meeting inner strength and possibility. I love how much George listened and learned from his own physical struggles and chose to rise up from them. His inner struggles led him to deep insights about himself. Congratulations George!
As a unique, young individual
with just the strangest issues,
physical abilities included,
from the incapability of using limbs
to being unable to keep my head screwed on my body,
led to classes,
led to lectures,
led to lessons;
bowling occurred first,
where my arms were twigs,
where they could snap at any moment,
while the ball flung from left gutter to the right,
going backwards at certain points,
and this was only part one of the project,
with my legs being the next step,
which strolled me to a path of dancing,
Irish step dancing,
where even though I had contained zero talent,
had no way of making my legs become pencils,
the people accepted me,
not only for my Irish roots,
but having a passion for wanting to become stronger than Ali,
wanting to become better than Flatley,
and that’s where the third step entered,
with my noggin latched into place,
different kinds of social issues on both ends on the spectrum,
where it became an incredible struggle,
that therapy landed right into my lap,
and even with the flaws,
the challenges,
the obstacles,
the maturity in me has risen,
and life has been a machine since the early days.
© This poem is the property of George Ferguson and permission to publish has been given by his family.
Look Again – A Poem by Mary Oliver
Thursday, December 19th, 2013
What you have never noticed about the toad, probably,
is that his tongue is attached not to the back of his mouth but
the front-how far it extends
when the fly hesitates on a near-enough leaf! Or that
his front feet, which are sometimes padded, hold three nimble
digits — had anyone
a piano small enough I think the toad could learn
to play something, a little Mozart maybe, inside
the cool cellar of the sandy hill — and if
the eyes bulge they have gold rims,
and if the smile is wide it never fails,
and the warts, the delicate uplifts of dust-colored skin, are
neither random nor suggestive of dolor, but rather are little streams of jewelry, in patterns of espousal and pleasure,
running up and down their crooked backs, sweet and alive in the sun.
─Mary Oliver
Breathe the Earth
Monday, November 25th, 2013
Today, like every other day, we wake up empty
and frightened. Don’t open the door to the study
and begin reading. Take down the dulcimer.
Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kiss the ground.
─Rumi
Love Endures
Friday, March 29th, 2013
Love asks.
Love expands.
Love invites.
Love creates.
Love celebrates.
Love welcomes.
Love dreams.
Love joins with more love.
Love endures.
Life as Our Meditation Practice
Monday, March 25th, 2013
It is easy to find peace in the quiet uninterrupted moments.
Seeking peace in the chaotic noisy moments is where our practice comes in.
Our daily meditation practice – Life.
Daily living is our meditation practice.
Vision and Action
Tuesday, October 16th, 2012
Breathe in your visions.
Breathe out your actions.
Be a Message of Love – National Coming Out Day
Thursday, October 11th, 2012
“We thought you were going to be a nun.” This was part of the conversation I had with my parents after coming out to them. My coming out came as a huge surprise to my parents as they thought I might enter religious life. When I asked myself how I wanted to live my life, I saw clearly that I had dreams of falling in love (with a woman). I knew I needed to love myself before I could fall in love with someone else. And knew I needed to proclaim who I am so I didn’t have to live in the shadows or live with shame. It wasn’t easy. It was very difficult for me to share and for my family to hear.
I am one of the lucky ones because I have a happy ending. My family loves me and my partner and vice-a-versa. For many gay people this isn’t true. There are still far too many people who can’t come out because it isn’t safe. There are far too many LGBT people who are beaten or suicidal. And so I encourage all of us to stand up and speak out on behalf of LGBT folks, especially young people.
Stand up. There are far too many messages of hate. We can send a message of love. We can be a message of love. I invite you to tell your LGBT friends you love them. You may think they know it, but trust me when I say they need to hear your support.
I love you.