“No one tells the oceans
or the trees
or the mountains that they’re too old.
They talk of how powerful,
how grounded,
Imagine if we thought the same way about ourselves as we got older.
Maybe we’d realize how spectacular we are.”
Becky Hemsley
Category Archives: Travel Adventure
Beauty Rising, Breathtakenly
Silver~
“How many years of beauty do I have left?
she asks me.
How many more do you want?
Here. Here is 34. Here is 50.
When you are 80 years old
and your beauty rises in ways
your cells cannot even imagine now
and your wild bones grow luminous and
ripe, having carried the weight
of a passionate life.
When your hair is aflame
with winter
and you have decades of
learning and leaving and loving
sewn into
the corners of your eyes
and your children come home
to find their own history
in your face.
When you know what it feels like to fail
ferociously
and have gained the
capacity
to rise and rise and rise again.
When you can make your tea
on a quiet and ridiculously lonely afternoon
and still have a song in your heart
Queen owl wings beating
beneath the cotton of your sweater.
Because your beauty began there
beneath the sweater and the skin,
remember?
This is when I will take you
into my arms and coo
YOU BRAVE AND GLORIOUS THING
you’ve come so far.
I see you.
Your beauty is breathtaking.”
~ Jeannette Encinias
The main photo at the top of this post is of my beloved Mom’s hands – age 91. The photo above Jeannette Encinias’ poem is of my Mom at age 90 in Bryce Canyon at sunrise, and the photo below is of my Mom with her Great Granddaughter Maddie at six weeks old. My Mom was breathtakenly beautiful.
Beauty at any age, at every age. Ages 90 and Six Weeks, Mom & Maddie
At the Darkest Moment
“At the darkest moment comes the light.”
-Joseph Campbell
“I danced with my shadows until they became part of my light.”-Jodi Livon
“The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places. “
Ernest Hemingway
Every Heart Is My Temple
“I belong to no religion.
My religion is love.
Every heart is my temple.”
~Rumi
Focusing on the Light
“The spirit of a time is an incredibly subtle, yet hugely powerful force. And it is comprised of the mentality and spirit of all individuals together. Therefore, the way you look at things is not simply a private matter. Your outlook actually and concretely affects what goes on. When you give in to helplessness, you collude with despair and add to it. When you take back your power and choose to see the possibilities for healing and transformation, your creativity awakens and flows to become an active force of renewal and encouragement in the world. In this way, even in your own hidden life, you can become a powerful agent of transformation in a broken, darkened world. There is a huge force field that opens when intention focuses and directs itself toward transformation.”-John O’Donohue
Focusing on the light as an active force of renewal and encouragement in the world… Thank you John O’Donohue, thank you to all the heart centered ones around the world doing all that they can, thank you for continuing to focus on the light, the goodness… It is difficult in these days. Let’s keep trying our best.
Everything is Prayer
“Let me seek then, the gift of silence and solitude, where everything I touch is turned into a prayer: where the sky is my prayer, the birds are my prayer, the wind in the trees is my prayer…”-Thomas Merton
Mountains, Woods, Rivers, Lakes, Beaches – Find Me Inside
Mountains, Woods, Rivers, Lakes, Beaches….
This is the God or nature of Spinoza:
“God would have said:
Stop praying and punching yourself in the chest!What I want you to do is go out into the world and enjoy your life.I want you to enjoy, sing, have fun and enjoy everything I’ve made for you.Stop going to those dark, cold temples that you built yourself and say they are my house!My house is in the mountains, in the woods, rivers, lakes, beaches. That’s where I live and there I express my love for you.Stop blaming me for your miserable life; I never told you there was anything wrong with you or that you were a sinner, or that your sexuality was a bad thing!Sex is a gift I have given you and with which you can express your love, your ecstasy, your joy. So don’t blame me for everything they made you believe.Stop reading alleged sacred scriptures that have nothing to do with me. If you can’t read me in a sunrise, in a landscape, in the look of your friends, in your son’s eyes…you will find me in no book!Trust me and stop asking me. Will you tell me how to do my job?Stop being so scared of me. I do not judge you, I criticize you, nor get angry, or bother, or punishment. I am pure love.Stop asking for forgiveness, there’s nothing to forgive. If I made you… I filled you with passions, limitations, pleasures, feelings, needs, inconsistencies… free will. How can I blame you if you respond to something I put in you? How can I punish you for being the way you are, if I’m the one who made you Do you think I could create a place to burn all my children who behave badly for the rest of eternity?What kind of god can do that?Forget any kind of commandments, any kind of laws; those are wiles to manipulate you, to control you, that only create guilt in you.Respect your peers and don’t do what you don’t want for yourself. All I ask is that you pay attention in your life, that your alert is your guide.My beloved, this life is not a test, not a step, not a step in the way, not a rehearsal, nor a prelude to paradise. This life is the only thing here and now and all you need.I have set you absolutely free, no prizes or punishments, no sins or virtues, no one carries a marker, no one keeps a record.You are absolutely free to create in your life heaven or hell.I could tell you if there’s anything after this life but I can give you a tip. Live as if there is no. As if this is your only chance to enjoy, to love, to exist.So, if there’s nothing, then you will have enjoyed the opportunity I gave you. And if there is, rest assured that I won’t ask if you behaved right or wrong, I’ll ask. Did you like it? Did you have fun? What did you enjoy the most? What did you learn?…Stop believing in me; believing is assuming, guessing, imagining. I don’t want you to believe in me, I want you to feel in you. I want you to feel me in you when you kiss your beloved, when you tuck your little girl, when you caress your dog, when you bathe in the sea.Stop praising me, what kind of egomaniac God do you think I am?I’m bored being praised, I’m tired of being thanked. Feeling grateful? Prove it by taking care of you, your health, your relationships, the world. Feeling looked at, shocked?… Express your joy! That’s the way to praise me.Stop complicating things and repeating as a parakeet what you’ve been taught about me.The only thing for sure is that you are here, that you are alive, that this world is full of wonders.What do you need more miracles for? Why so many explanations?
look for me outside, you won’t find me. Find me inside… there I am beating on you.”-Spinoza
Doors
“The doors to the world of the wild Self are few
but precious.If you have a deep scar, that is a door.
If you have an old, old story,
that is a door.If you love the sky and the water so much you almost cannot bear it,
that is a door.If you yearn for a deeper life, a full life, a sane life, that is a door.”
-Clarissa Pinkola Estés
No Matter How Long You Live
“The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. Do not grow old, no matter how long you live. Never cease to stand like curious children before the Great Mystery into which we were born.”-Albert Einstein
Spiritual Congruence
Caroline Myss is a pioneer in healing, truth finding, spirituality and individual power that I have learned from through the years and her post today really resonated with me. Thoughts, power and where it originates, the word, and the fruitlessness of judgement… Her explanations provide simple yet powerful paths to truths of our existence here on the planet! Myss calls maintaining spiritual congruence the fifth mystical law. Here they are:
“Practice spiritual congruence by living these truths:
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You should say only what you believe and believe what you say.
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Power originates behind your eyes, not in front of your eyes. Once power becomes visible, it evaporates. True power is invisible.
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Thought precedes the creation of matter. Therefore, your thoughts are instruments of creation as much as your words, deeds, and finances. Become conscious about the quality of your thoughts, because each one sets patterns of cause and effect into motion. Every thought is a tool. Every thought is a prayer.
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Judgement anchors you to the person or thing you judge, making you its servant. Judge others too harshly and you become their prisoner.”
-Caroline Myss
