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Follow your bliss~

11/28/2018

“If you follow your bliss you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living.” This wisdom of Joseph Campbell’s rests deep within me. Preparations for my trip to Florence on Friday are in good order as I get ready to follow my bliss and live the life I want to live once again.
     Packing is completed. Library books returned. My Kindle is ready. Visits to church friends are scheduled or completed. Fourteen meals for my husband sit in the freezer. Friends and family are doing well.
     When I first read these words of Campbell, I embraced the idea of following one’s bliss as something everyone ‘should’ do. But times have changed, and so have I; his words feel more nuanced and complex. What about the families tracking across Mexico to enter our country? Perhaps they are following their bliss, but it surely isn’t the same bliss as the border crossing I will experience upon entering Italy.
     I could go on and on, except I think these few words are enough to continue my thinking, and to get you pondering your bliss as well.

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Positive gratitudes

11/23/2018

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On this day after Thanksgiving I could be talking in my usual way about gratitude--what we’re grateful for, what we ‘should’ be grateful for, personal graitudes, and gratitudes for the world. I’m all in for these kinds of expressions, but today I’m thinking of the power of stating gratitude in positive terms. For example, “How wonderful we can get out for a walk,” instead of, “Well at least it is not raining.”
Speaking positively keeps me away from making judgments. I more apt to see people for who they are, rather than who they are not.
So, on this day after Thanksgiving, I am grateful for friends and family just as they are, and for the food just as it was prepared and served.

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Church fair today

11/17/2018

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No silence, solitude or simplicity today. I’m helping with the noise, community, and complexity of our church fair, “The Twelve Shoppes of Christmas”. It’s a yearly even that brings us together as a church community and raises money for operating expenses and outreach. My church as no endowment so we live, work and love close to the bone. Hmm, probably a good thing but it adds a certain stressful way of being if we let it.

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My cottage-by-the-sea at home~

11/11/2018

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Today's sunrise

I continue to reminisce about my cottage-by-the-sea (CBTS) days. In fact the cottage has become my muse.
     As I mentioned recently, I’ve been looking for a new acronym for what I’m trying to create here at home. House-by-the-road (HBTR), house-in-the-woods (HITW). Nothing resonates; but that doesn’t matter, because life matters, and here in this house the CBTS mood continues to make itself visible and active--silence, solitude, simplicity, and times alone.
    I notice that I am becoming more intentional about the choices I make to assure this. The rhythm at the original cottage included daily walks, times to sit and be, pray, to meditate, read and write, and to do a jigsaw puzzle. Absent was an evening glass of wine, the telephone, and the TV (I’m not there yet on this last one). Those continue to be some of the physical and mental markers that support the spiritual (emotional and psychological) way of being for which all human being strive.
    Although I had a daily routine at the cottage, I didn’t have a to-do list, nor did I have others depending on me. That made sense for the four days a week I was there, but it doesn’t work for my life here at home. However, getting rid of being compulsively and unwittingly busy, busy, busy does make senses. In fact, it is one of the essential criteria for silence, solitude and simplicity, which leads to that place of inner peace deep in our souls.

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Very grateful, very hopeful~

11/7/2018

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I feel mysteriously calm about yesterday’s election results. No, not all of my candidates won, but enough did to make me think that democracy is still at work. It’s not the thinking that brought on the calm, but the realization that not everyone agrees with me, and that’s okay because good is prevailing. I feel hopeful.
My words may sound trite and obvious, but my feelings aren’t. These feelings of relief, acceptance, compassion, and love for all human beings are hard to come by. They are deep and yet light. This morning they got me out for an early walk to appreciate the beauty and freedom of the moment. Very grateful, very hopeful.

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Silence, solitude, and simplicity in busy times~

11/5/2018

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With all the action going on these days—Boston’s World Series win and the midterm elections coming up tomorrow—I’ve decided to take the day for silence, solitude, and simplicity. Reading, writing, meditating, knitting, and visiting some friends who are now spending their days in assisted living facilities.
I tell you this not because I think YOU need to settle into life’s big picture, but because I know that’s what I need.
Memories of wisdom from friends and family help. My mom would be telling me to go out and do something for someone else. A friend recently told me that when she gets up she tells herself, “Let me not make this day about me.” My husband and I, when we remember, start the day offering a couple of gratitudes, one for the world, one for ourselves. Reading, writing, knitting, and meditating always settles me down.
All of these actions touch on silence, solitude, and simplicity; not always out there in my everyday life, but in my heart.

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Hopeful speaking and writing~

11/3/2018

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During these contentious political times the words Richard Rohr posted last week prompted me to reflect on the tone of this blog and the underlying message I want to convey.

My hope, whenever I speak or write, is to help clear away the impediments to receiving, allowing, trusting, and participating in a foundational Love.

     Yes, Richard Rohr, my hope and your hope are similar, but sometimes I think my posts are rather boring and self-involved. The two go together; boring because I don’t tell stories about other people, and self-involved because I only tell stories about myself.
        Thus I don’t let you know about the many friends I see in person, talk with on the phone, and keep up with over the internet. On this blog they are pretty much invisible, although their lives, with both joys and concerns, are blessings in helping me lead my life and write about silence, solitude, simplicity.
     It would be much easier to share my friends’ stories, and it would be much more interesting for you readers to hear a good story. But as you know, I work hard/struggle not to judge, gossip or speak at another’s expense-- impediments to Love.
       Consequently, I’m left with one main character—me. My word choice is self-involvement, but hopefully not self-promotion. I want to share my thoughts as I strive to receive, allow, trust, and participate in love.

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Follow your bliss~

Positive gratitudes

Church fair today

My cottage-by-the-sea at home~

Very grateful, very hopeful~

Silence, solitude, and simplicity in busy times~

Hopeful speaking and writing~

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