The Speech of Rain - Thomas Merton

The rain.....fills the woods with an immense and confused sound.
It covers the flat roof of the cabin and its porch with inconsistent
and controlled rhythms.  And I listen, because it reminds me
again and again that the whole world runs by rhythms I have not
yet learned to recognize.

The rain [surrounds] the cabin with its enormous virginal myth,
a whole world of meaning, of secrecy, of silence, or rumor.
Think of it: all that speech pouring down, selling nothing,
judging nobody, drenching the thick mulch of dead leaves,
soaking the trees, filling the gullies and crannies of the wood
with water, washing out the places where men have stripped the
hillside!  What a thing it is to sit absolutely alone, in the forest
at night, cherished by this wonderful, unintelligible, perfectly
innocent speech, the most comforting speech in the world,
the talk that rain makes by itself all over the ridges, and the
talk of the water courses everywhere in the hollows!

.....It will talk as long as it wants, this rain.  As long as it talks
I am going to listen.

Thomas Merton
excerpt from Thomas Merton's essay:
The Rain and the Rhinoceros,
Raids on the Unspeakable 

With thanks to Heron Dance

~

Photo from the internet

 

The Soul's Rhythm - John O'Donohue

We should not force ourselves to change by hammering our
lives into any predetermined shape.  We do not need to operate
according to the idea of a predetermined program or plan for our
lives.  Rather, we need to practice a new art of attention to our
inner rhythm of our days and lives.  This attention brings a new
awareness of our own human and divine presence.

It is far more creative to work with the idea of mindfulness than
with the idea of will. Too often people try to change their lives
by using the will as a kind of hammer to beat their life into proper
shape.  The intellect identifies the goal of the program, and the
will accordingly forces the life into shape.  This way of approaching
the sacredness of one's own presence is externalistic and violent.
It brings you falsely outside of your own self and you can spend
years lost in the wilderness of your own mechanical, spiritual
programs.  You can perish in a famine of your own making.

If you work with a different rhythm, you will come easily and
naturally home to your self.  Your soul knows the geography of
your destiny.  Your soul alone has a map of your future, therefore
you can trust this indirect, oblique side of your self.  If you do,
it will take you where you need to go, but more importantly it will
teach you a kindness of rhythm in your journey.  There are no
general principles for this art of being.  Yet the signature of this
unique journey is inscribed deeply in each soul.  If you attend to
your self and seek to come into your own presence, you will find
exactly the right rhythm for your life.  The senses are generous
pathways which can bring you home.

John O'Donohue
from Anam Cara

via The Beauty We Love

For One Who is Exhausted, A Blessing - John O'Donohue

When the rhythm of the heart becomes hectic,
Time takes on the strain until it breaks;
Then all the unattended stress falls in
On the mind like an endless, increasing weight.

The light in the mind becomes dim.
Things you could take in your stride before
Now become laborsome events of will.

Weariness invades your spirit.

Gravity begins falling inside you,
Dragging down every bone.

The tide you never valued has gone out.
And you are marooned on unsure ground.
Something within you has closed down;
And you cannot push yourself back to life.

You have been forced to enter empty time.
The desire that drove you has relinquished.
There is nothing else to do now but rest
And patiently learn to receive the self
You have forsaken in the race of days.

At first your thinking will darken
And sadness take over like listless weather.
The flow of unwept tears will frighten you.

You have traveled too fast over false ground;
Now your soul has come to take you back.

Take refuge in your senses, open up
To all the small miracles you rushed through.

Become inclined to watch the way of rain
When it falls slow and free.

Imitate the habit of twilight,
Taking time to open the well of color
That fostered the brightness of day.

Draw alongside the silence of stone
Until its calmness can claim you.
Be excessively gentle with yourself.

Stay clear of those vexed in spirit.
Learn to linger around someone of ease
Who feels they have all the time in the world.

Gradually, you will return to yourself,
Having learned a new respect for your heart
And the joy that dwells far within slow time.

John O'Donohue
"A Blessing For One Who is Exhausted"
From - To Bless the Space Between Us

~

Thank you Michel !
No Mind's Land

For A New Beginning - John O'Donohue

In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
where your thoughts never think to wander,
this beginning has been quietly forming,
waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire,
feeling the emptiness inside you,
noticing how you willed yourself on,
still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety
and the gray promise that sameness whispered,
heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
and out you stepped onto new ground,
your eyes young again with energy and dream,
a path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not yet clear,
you can trust the promise of this opening;
unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
that is at one with your life's desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;
hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
for your soul senses the world that awaits you.

John O'Donohue
"For A New Beginning"

~

Photo - Portal Cloud

Divine Immersion...

“Perhaps today is not a day for answers
 and unshakable certainties.
It is a day for bird song and staying close to the questions
as thy walk us down familiar paths
on Spring mornings.”

Jeff Foster

This morning after rising I went out to leave a pie pan of birdseed for the Mourning Doves (and squirrels) who could not feed from the Finch feeder, but ate the sparse seed droppings on the ground.  The Doves cooed their familiar song in the branches above, waiting for me to bring the plate. 

I noticed a lovely shadow of a dragonfly garden ornament on the mottled grey patio and went back in to get my camera.

The morning air was gentle, quiet and soothing, an early Summer smell on the breeze drew me on to the scraggly, yet to be finished back garden across the yard…

I stood silently in the garden, aware that I was immersed in a kind of sanctity of Divine Silence.  The day noise had already begun: the highway traffic, several airplanes, and the noises of daily living: dogs, birds, voices, lawn mowers, construction noise in the distance…  A small Monarch butterfly flitted in, catching my awareness, alighting briefly, and then flitted away just as quickly, seemingly unaffected by the noises of life – immersed in the Divineness of its own Being.  Such delight I can only imagine – being immersed in one’s own Divine Being…

There is so much to be done this time of year that it sometimes drives me through my days.  I always feel like I’m trying to keep up with life! – as it is being lived…  But I don’t want to be a slave to life’s “doings”!  I’d rather stop the doings - and enjoy Life – the Divine Beingness of Life ItSelf – unaffected by the noises of life’s requirements.  I want to be “driven” by/immersed in the Divine Being that I am, allowing Inspiration to drive my day.  So everything went on hold – for today anyway - except for experiencing the Divine Rhythm of LIFE!

~ Divine Immersion ~

Stopping the Madness...

Just within the past few days I had a simple awareness that gave me an Ah-ha moment.  I realized that my anger and frustration towards my family dynamic has a lot to do with my being too emotionally invested in wanting to fix it/them – to make life better *for* them, to rescue them from their life situation – feeling responsible to *do* something about their situation – and feeling helpless to do so; wanting both my mother and sister to *see* their wounds and the dynamic of their situation, to get help so they don’t have to wallow in their pain and dysfunction - AND so that I don’t have to feel responsible *for* them.  But the “madness” (anger) that I feel is really because I cannot *control* the situation, the outcome, their unwillingness to take action to alleviate their own pain.  And - because I don’t want to have to pay the consequences for *their* choices.  There are always consequences for the unconscious choices of others…  In essence I can’t get them to *want* to change the way they are doing life.  So I realized I just had to stop the madness for *myself* - to not sacrifice myself to their madness, as they unconsciously choose to live it.  I realized that I just had to let them live it in their own way, and focus on what is really important – stopping the madness in my own mind.

Still entangled in the family drama that had become a veil, blinding me from seeing clearly, from seeing the larger context in which the whole drama of life is played out – the space of Silent Aware Consciousness - it took 3 days of confusion, floundering, anger, sadness and Silent Meditation to clearly experience the clear, clean, open space of Aware Conscious within again.  It meant getting my self out of the way – letting go of the need to be on top of things, vigilant, alert, prepared – extricating myself emotionally from my role in the family drama that I have entrained with, and listening for the internal Rhythm of Being once again.  It also meant not allowing myself to be distracted by the family drama that keeps me living on the surface, but returning again and again to the Silent space and fluidity of True Beingness.

This little piece of writing below reflects (for me anyway) – that inner yearning to live authentically from that place of Truth – the greater context of Aware Consciousness. Of course each of us would define what that would look like differently, as each of us is a unique expression of Truth - but maybe you’ll find yourself in it too.  This was a journal entry from January 1, 2011 that I found with a “Post-It” note attached to it (see below).  I have put it in poem form.

I want to walk through life
truly *seeing* - truly Aware…
 *Awake* to the Truth of Eternal Being…

Open to Life –
 not with mental judgments, opinions, and interpretations
 of what is happening,
 or what should be happening,
 or what I wish would happen,
  but with receptivity,
 openness,
 acceptance,
 allowing.

I want to See *everything* as Living Beingness;
 every leaf that drops,
 or snowflake that falls,
every being -
 with the same innocent wonder and amazement as I did as a child
as if seeing Life living for the first time…

  I want to be in Love with Life again –
 if I ever was…
  Maybe Loving Life in new ways –

I want to Hear
the laughter
in my
Heart

I want to Experience
everything
with curiosity
and equanimity

I want to Notice…
every thought,

expression,
and feeling
as it arises
without
trying to confine it,
or suppress it
before it is expressed;
or correct others
in their expression.

Save me from the arrogance of
thinking that I know what others need,
or how to “help” or “fix” them;
allowing others to be who they are,
trusting that Life is taking
them where they need to go,
just as It is me…

Let me be free from the entanglements
of the mind
that keep me compliant,
and complicit,
with the world’s ways…

Life is a paradigm of endless pathways,
and I want to risk not following the rules,
the well-worn paths.
Instead - rising above
the familiarity
of “the path”
to see what’s *really* here…

I want to live
in
the simplicity
of
the
ever-unfolding
luminosity
of

Truth.

And may I have the courage
to speak with fierce grace
to those who would try to
quell this passion,
to strip this enthusiasm,
and suffocate this spontaneity
for
the radiance
and
clarity
of

Truth

Mystic Meandering
Meditative Writings
January 1, 2011

And here is that quote that was stuck onto the journal page with a sticky note – which I also put in the form of a poem…

“If you want to see what’s behind the curtain of reality,
to take the red pill
and discover what the matrix really is,
you have to have a yearning for Absolute Truth.

You have to be willing to give up everything.
The cost is literally all of you -
to leave ‘everything’
to know and experience
the Truth:
your materialism,
your psychological addictions,
your identity,
your life-long programming,
even family
and
friends…”

Author Unknown

And I would assume this also means blogging… :)

Please Note:  This does not mean I intend to walk out
the front door and abandon my family :)
They know I am always available to them.
  Any of you who have known the
deep yearning for Truth will understand...
Essentially what I am saying and feeling
 is not allowing myself to be distracted
from this passion for Truth that I feel...

And - it's about seeing the difference between having
compassion for others
and being co-dependent -
not rescuing people from the consequences
of their own choices and their life's path...

~

Photos

Top – Reflections of light through stained glass window.

#2 – I experimented with a function called Inversion,
making the photo look like a negative,
only with color.  Amazing how that works!
I love this affect!

#3 – Reflection in the window

 

Domesticity - The Mundance - Part 2

"Inside this new love,

die.

Your way begins on the
other side.

Become the sky.
Take an axe to the
prison wall.
Escape.
Walk out like someone
suddenly born into color.
Do it now.
Your old life was a
frantic running
from silence."

~ Rumi

I have a friend with whom I used to share tea and talk with over a period of several months last year. We would discuss “spiritual stuff.” He has a wonderful art studio/sanctuary where we’d meet. He goes to his studio nearly every day to do art that is not for sale – just art for arts sake, read, sit in meditation for hours, talk with friends, or otherwise live his Heart’s desires, following the creative muse, and, in my mind anyway, the “spiritual life.” (Gee - I wonder what his wife does!? Keeps the home fires burning no doubt!) I raised the issue of the “Mundance” with him one time. He very nicely “invited” me to see that the mundane was just as “sacred” as what we determine to be the more “spiritual” activities. He assumed the role of a “teacher” and gave an example of when he stayed at an ashram and was required to scrub the floors of one of the buildings every day. He wanted a job in the “temple” itself – but was relegated to the more mundane areas and activities – for which he was rather bummed and irritated. (Isn’t that my point?!) He had to scrub the toilets and floors until he learned the lesson that the “mundane” activity is just as “sacred” as working in the temple. And then he was allowed a job in the temple. Hmmmm – sounds rather patriarchal to me, perpetuating old paradigms of efforting and working hard to *earn* the reward of “enlightenment” – domesticating the sacred fire that burns within. Isn’t this just more conditioning? And – doesn’t *he* get to retreat to his studio (temple) when life gets a little too mundane?! (I am not a feminist by any stretch of the imagination.):)

While I understand that everything is sacred, that there is no separation between the mundane and the “spiritual”, that only thought makes them separate and unequal, to me it feels deeper than just this division of the mind. It’s as if my Being is trying to free Itself from the confines and constraints that IT is experiencing – like a Divine Discontent. It’s like “I” am trying to break out of a “role”, an “identity”, the conditioning that constrains my Being, that has kept me dancing to a tune that I feel out of sync with – and soar to the Heart of Being. (I'm a "Mystic" remember...) I experience the mundane dance as a complete waste of life affirming energy. But once again that’s my mind - a mind-made story that I tell myself about how deadening domesticity is. I know, after awakening – chop wood, carry water… But somehow that doesn’t feed my Heart…

Men – in general – it seems, are able to follow a “spiritual path” more easily. (Or maybe this is just another delusion.) Jesus, Buddha, Ramana Maharshi, Nisargadatta come to mind. I have not studied the lives of these teachers so I may be mistaken here, but it seems they pretty much followed the “call” of their Heart, if you will. Jesus left his parents at age 12 to seek the wisdom of “God”, Buddha left his young wife and child to discover the Truth of Existence, Ramana left home at age 16 to live at the base of Mt. Arunachala to become “Enlightened.” Nisargadatta left his family for 5 years to study with a teacher (although he also worked to support his family during that time). These men devoted their lives to “enlightenment”, awakening, spirituality, “the path”, Self-realization, Truth, in whatever ways they could. I wonder what the modern day enlightened women do, like Gangaji, Neelam, Pamela Wilson, Mukti and many others. Do they spend their days in meditation – living monastically - writing words of wisdom, teaching others “Truth”? Do they do their own domestic duties, or do they have a cadre of people (other women?) surrounding them, willing to cook, clean and otherwise do the duties of the mundane… And does it really matter? – No… I realize this is *my* issue…

So it would seem a little time sitting with this is in order. Maybe it’s as simple as time management, discipline, shedding some bad habits, and an attitude adjustment. That’s probably part of it – and something I’ve started working on – bringing awareness to those areas. Asking: What is this *really*? And, what is needed here? But it feels much deeper than the surface solutions – as beneficial and practical as they are… But what’s underneath this?

It *feels* like the call of the Heart once again: the Self calling the Self to itSelf again and again *through* the veils of the mundane. It’s as if there’s an “entrainment” with a deeper dance that is needed here; a birthing into a new rhythm with life… Not shunning the mundane, not sacrificing my Self, but honoring the call of the Heart –the homing call; dancing the Rhythm of the true Self; *abiding* in the Heart of Being where everything is congruent…

May we all abide in the Song of the Heart -

intimately dancing “The Dance.”

~*~

Domesticity - The Mundance - Part 1

"We are perishing for lack of fulfillment of our greatest needs.
We are cut off from the great sources of our inward nourishment and renewal."
DH Lawrence

I actually wrote a variation of this blog post last year and never posted it. So I thought I’d resurrect it, polish it off a little and see where it goes…

At a very young age we women are basically trained (conditioned) to be domestic, to be caretakers, rather than follow our passion, our Heart, or - follow a path of “spirituality” the way the sages of old did. We know this. For me it has become a real issue lately. I turned 60 last year, and realized that for some 54 years my energies have been primarily focused on living like Hestia – Goddess of Home and Hearth - sacrificing my Self at the altar of domesticity in one form or another. Maybe you know her too. Even though I never had children, I have worked full time at various jobs throughout my life. And - there has always been a very strong yearning or “call” all my life for Truth, Wisdom, Enlightenment – all the things I cluster together under the umbrella of “Spirituality.” But there was always “domesticity” – the dance of the mundane - a “typical woman’s” life, as I’m sure many of you can relate to. It was a role I unconsciously assumed *because* of my conditioning - because there was no encouragement to live creatively, dare I say “spiritually.” No encouragement to follow my Heart’s desire, or even to know what that was… I assumed my role was to “take care of others.” I typically chose stereotypical female “care-taking” roles – nursing, massage therapy, energy worker, receptionist, wife.

Even though I have not worked *for pay* outside the home for the last several years – due to health issues, I still find it hard to follow my Heart – to live simply and contemplatively, to allow creativity to flow, to spend significant time communing with Being-Self in all its forms – listening deeply to the wisdom within; to follow what I consider to be a “spiritual” life. I know I know I sound spoiled. There are others who live far more difficult lives than I do. Yet, I have my own impediments and limitations that have made life less than “cushy” – physically, emotionally and financially. And now I seem to be creating duality when I write about this division between my vision of a “spiritual” life and the mundane, so I’ll reword it: I’d like to live with less chaos and drama – mine and others, less complexity, less entanglement in the needs of others, and less dancing with the mundane requirements of daily living. Instead I want to devote my heart beats to the passion of my Heart – which happens to be “spirituality.” By that I mean a deep *abiding* sense of communing with the Heart of Being (however we call it: Awareness, Beingness, Buddha Nature, etc.) Isn’t that really what we all want? Isn’t this what we search for and what our loneliness, angst, grief, frustration, fear, anger and melancholy really are: A deep heart desire for an internal, abiding awareness, connection and ongoing communion with our True Nature?

When my life energies are constantly being drawn to the mundane and family obligations it feels like an abandonment of my spirit, or True Self. I am repelled by the requirements of daily living. Hestia would be disappointed I’m sure… Some days I just want to sit in open-ended meditation for as long as it feels right, without having to get up and do what needs to be done, without having to make a meal, without having to keep the domestic home fires burning. There’s always the distraction of the mundane. And where does the time go that there seems to be so little of it for creativity, for Stillness, for the “inner life.” How did life get so chaotic and consuming of spirit?! A retreat is not the answer here – both physically and financially, but a total change in lifestyle, creating an *environment* for the actual *living* of my Heart’s desire… And that doesn’t seem likely either…

My husband was gone for four days over the last Christmas Holiday visiting his family. However, out of the 4 days I only managed to eek out 1 full day of uninterrupted “monastery time”, because the other days were spent with my family and doing the mundance. That one day was delightful! The silence of the house was breathtakingly *full.* So much time for just sacred Silence. I lived according to the inner rhythms and timings of Being-Self, with very little mundane activities – and yes solitude. I reveled in it. I want to *live* this way – not eek out days here and there, but *living* life in sync with the *natural* Rhythms of Beingness. Several years ago I spent much more time in silent “meditation” on a daily basis, which is when creativity and insights and wisdom flowed freely; which now seems lost to me – drowned by the distractions of the mundance. Life as it is now does not nourish the deeper needs of my Being…

Life as it *isn’t*, at the moment, is still life as it is, of course. So how do I harmonize “living life as it is” with my spirits starvation. I don’t think “living life as it is” means resignation to “mundaneness.” It’s not either/or. The question really is: How do I/we live congruently with my/our True Nature – expressed *in* and through the mundane? How do I/we live a life that is conducive to the Heart’s True desire?

Part 2 tomorrow