Category Archives: Sweet Breathing

Flowers, Nature, Photo Gallery, Photography, Sweet Breathing, Travel Adventure

Columbia River Gorge – A Gallery of Photos

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The Columbia River Gorge, bonds Washington and Oregon, and has draped them both with overwhelming power and beauty.  And the Gorge and its waters have touched my soul.

I long to spend more time here.  There is a depth to be penetrated over time, in the inner and the outer realms. Rich tapestries of greens, radiance of waterfalls, myriad wildflowers, mysterious forests, sumptuous grand canyons, all endlessly beautiful. They touch the deepest part of me.

Every turn holds a wonder – a sometimes quiet and often times shuddering exuberance of majesty.  Hidden wonders everywhere waiting to be explored.

Yes, I need more time here.

“Water is fluid, soft, and yielding. But water will wear away rock, which is rigid and cannot yield. As a rule, whatever is fluid, soft, and yielding will overcome whatever is rigid and hard. This is another paradox: What is soft is strong.”

-Lao-Tzu

“Water is the one substance from which the earth can conceal nothing; it sucks out its innermost secrets and brings them to our very lips.”

-Jean Giraudoux

A few facts about the Columbia River Gorge (from the website for Foundation for Water & Energy Education; http://fwee.org/environment/what-makes-the-columbia-river-basin-unique-and-how-we-benefit/):

  • Within the Basin, there are 2,500 square miles of waterways and lakes.
  • The Columbia River and its tributaries account for about 219,000 square miles of drainage in seven western states.
  • The Basin consists of the Rocky Mountains to the east and north, the Cascade Range on the west, and the Great Basin to the south.
  • The Columbia River is the fourth largest river in North America.
  • The Columbia River originates in British Columbia and flows 1,214 miles to the Pacific Ocean near Astoria, Oregon.
  • The Columbia is fed by a number of major tributaries including the three largest, the Kootenai, the Clark Fork-Pend Oreille and the Snake rivers along with the Payette, the Sultan, the Cowlitz, the Santiam and the Willamette.
  • The Columbia River is second only to the Missouri-Mississippi River System in terms of annual run-off as the water flows to the Pacific Ocean.
Sweet Breathing

At No Other Time Than the Autumn

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“At no other time (than autumn) does the earth let itself be inhaled in one smell, the ripe earth; in a smell that is in no way inferior to the smell of the sea, bitter where it borders on taste, and more honeysweet where you feel it touching the first sounds. Containing depth within itself, darkness, something of the grave almost.”

-Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters on Cezanne

“He found himself wondering at times, especially in the autumn, about the wild lands, and strange visions of mountains that he had never seen came into his dreams.”

-J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

Sweet Breathing

Ethics

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The Native American Code of Ethics originally published in the Inter-Tribal Times in October of 1994.

Depth in simplicity, honor in dealing with humanity and the earth.

Twenty tenants to live by…

It is done, it is good.  All My Relations.

1. Rise with the sun to pray. Pray alone. Pray often. The Great Spirit will listen, if you only speak.

2. Be tolerant of those who are lost on their path. Ignorance, conceit, anger, jealousy and greed stem from a lost soul. Pray that they will find guidance.

3. Search for yourself, by yourself. Do not allow others to make your path for you. It is your road, and yours alone. Others may walk it with you, but no one can walk it for you.

4. Treat the guests in your home with much consideration. Serve them the best food, give them the best bed and treat them with respect and honor.

5. Do not take what is not yours whether from a person, a community, the wilderness or from a culture. It was not earned nor given. It is not yours.

6. Respect all things that are placed upon this earth – whether it be people or plant.

7. Honor other people’s thoughts, wishes and words. Never interrupt another or mock or rudely mimic them. Allow each person the right to personal expression.

8. Never speak of others in a bad way. The negative energy that you put out into the universe will multiply when it returns to you.

9. All persons make mistakes. And all mistakes can be forgiven.

10. Bad thoughts cause illness of the mind, body and spirit. Practice optimism.

11. Nature is not FOR us, it is a PART of us. Animals, plants and other living creatures are all part of your worldly family.

12. Children are the seeds of our future. Plant love in their hearts and water them with wisdom and life’s lessons. When they are grown, give them space to grow.

13. Avoid hurting the hearts of others. The poison of your pain will return to you.

14. Be truthful at all times. Honesty is the test of one’s will within this universe.

15. Keep yourself balanced. Your Mental self, Spiritual self, Emotional self, and Physical self need to be strong, pure and healthy. Work out the body to strengthen the mind. Grow rich in spirit to cure emotional ails.

16. Make conscious decisions as to who you will be and how you will react. Be responsible for your own actions.

17. Respect the privacy and personal space of others. Do not touch the personal property of others – especially sacred and religious objects. This is forbidden.

18. Be true to yourself first. You cannot nurture and help others if you cannot nurture and help yourself first.

19. Respect others religious beliefs. Do not force your belief on others.

20. Share your good fortune with others. Participate in charity.

 

Sweet Breathing

Meditations on Summer – A Gallery of Photos

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(*You can click onto any individual image to see a full size version, and then click the right hand arrow to see all images in full size.)

“The summer night is like a perfection of thought.”

-Wallace Stevens

“And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.”

― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

“Then followed that beautiful season… Summer….
Filled was the air with a dreamy and magical light; and the landscape
Lay as if new created in all the freshness of childhood.”

-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

 

 

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Sweet Breathing

Everything Real

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Sometimes you read something that resonates as if you had written it yourself!  When I read this quote it was surely one of those times.

I think Victoria and I would get along famously!

*I’d have to add books and wine though!

“I just want to live in a world of mountains,

coffee, campfires, cabins and golden trees,

and run round with a camera and a notebook,

learning the inner workings of everything real.”

-Victoria Erickson

My living with coffee, campfires, cabins, golden trees, cameras and a notebook represented in photos below.  Living the dream… (you can click onto any image for a full size version, then hit the arrow to see each image in turn).

Sweet Breathing

Grace

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May we be unified in Grace…

“I do not at all understand the mystery of grace – only that it meets us where we are but does not leave us where it found us.”
-Anne Lamott
“Grace is not part of consciousness; it is the amount of light in our souls, not knowledge nor reason.”
-Pope Francis
“For me, every hour is grace.”

-Elie Wiesel

“Every moment of your life is infinitely creative and the universe is endlessly bountiful. Just put forth a clear enough request, and everything your heart desires must come to you.”

-Mahatma Gandhi

Sweet Breathing

To Be Found

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“The moment when, after many years
of hard work and a long voyage
you stand in the center of your room,
house, half-acre, square mile, island, country,
knowing at last how you got there,
and say, I own this,

is the same moment when the trees unloose
their soft arms from around you,
the birds take back their language,
the cliffs fissure and collapse,
the air moves back from you like a wave
and you can’t breathe.

No, they whisper. You own nothing.
You were a visitor, time after time
climbing the hill, planting the flag, proclaiming.
We never belonged to you.
You never found us.
It was always the other way round.”

-Margaret Atwood

Sweet Breathing

You Are This Flower

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“The breath is coming in and out now, whether you believe you are worthy of it or not.

The earth is unconditionally supporting you. She is holding you whether you believe you deserve to be held or not. Rest in her presence.

The breath will be gone at some point, usually much sooner than we’d all like. Breathe deeply now. Breathing is only now. There is no “breathing in the future.”

“No matter what is happening in your life – maybe you have lost hope, you’re confused, your heart is broken, or an old dream has died. Or even if you’re experiencing some joy, some peace, if things are going okay. It is not an ordinary moment. It is never ordinary inside your heart.

The only thing we know for sure is that we will be returned to the vastness soon. Let us not forget what is most important, never apologize for the yearning in our hearts, and not wait any longer to be fully here.

Let us renew the vow we once made to not abandon ourselves, our emotions, our vulnerability, our bodies, our sensitivity. With the sun, the moon, and the stars as our witness, we will no longer pathologize pure feeling and the longing that has been placed inside us.

Let us take a risk on this new day, like a flower who cannot hold back any longer from erupting with color, with fragrance, with life, with her song. You are this flower. Attune to what is truly happening here. This world needs you now more than ever. Please don’t forget what you are.”

-Matt Licata