Tuesday, September 30, 2014

For The River

There is a little book by John O'Donohue called "To Bless the Space Between Us".  I opened it this morning as I sometimes do, to see what message I would get.  It opened to "In Praise of Water".  One of the passages is:  "Let us bless the grace of water.....The courage of the river to continue, believe in the slow fall of ground, always falling further, toward the unseen ocean."  It goes on; there is more, and I stopped there.
The courage of the river to continue.  We can look at or remember the nature of our lives... that it is something that flows from beginning to end without really stopping.  Life is a lot like water that springs up and starts it's way down hill... moving around rocks and limbs and high places, seeking the way down, finding the easy route.  It takes courage to go where the flow is strongest.  That route holds the greatest potential for movement, and sometimes we just get tired and want to stop in the eddy.  We want to stop to rest, and the danger there is that we get stuck in the swirl, going round and around without forward movement.  Resting maybe, wondering what is beyond certainly.
Get back in the strongest flow, be courageous and welcome the adventure that is your life.  'Believe in the slow fall of ground' ahead of you; take that step, knowing it is leading you toward the 'unseen ocean' that is your life's true meaning.

Wednesday, September 24, 2014

Stepping Out/Stepping In

Last week at this time we were starting our third day of coach training in LA. :) I like it there. The Torrance Marriott is right next door to the first place I worked when I moved to that area....to be with the woman I loved. It was a real adventure. I grew up in a village of 300 [we didn't really live IN the village, but on the outskirts] where the biggest thing was the summer when the resorters would come up to spend their vacations at the lake. Just across the road from my front yard was a pretty little lake and I grew up swimming and canoeing and sailing in a tiny little dingy. It was heaven. Anyway, at age 38 I found myself moving to LA. The two places couldn't be much different, but I've found that people create their small communities within larger ones, and I didn't have to live in ALL of the greater Los Angeles area. Thank god. I had a wonderful time while I lived there and made some big changes in how I am in the world. It was also a time when I met people who would become life-long friends. Not much is better than that!
This morning I thought about you, and about how it is easy sometimes to lose track of who we are.... that our circumstances take hold now and then, even when we've learned to pay attention and do what we can to NOT be governed by them. My circumstances in LA were initially not ideal [aside from getting to live with someone I really loved and with whom I connected in a very solid way], and it was probably a 'dumb' thing to do. I took that step into the unknown in order to accomplish something beyond what I had been up until that time. I didn't really know that's what I was doing. I was just drawn by something bigger than myself. By stepping out of my comfortable small box, I was stepping into a life that has continued to expand and bring more joy, opportunity, love and freedom.
So this morning I want to encourage you to do something a little different today. Stretch into something new, talk with a new person or take a different route home after work. Step out.