Silent Joy in Advent Peace

Wordless Wonder can override the noisiest chaos. Oh, you have to be open to it, no doubt about that. And usually you have to stop and make a little bubble around yourself for wonder to grow.

I believe one of the most needed pieces of the Christmas story — and the whole world regardless of tradition can learn from this — is that the world can stop and wonder at Mystery. And that we do well to do that.

Silencing the criticism and the indifference and the, let’s be clear, bullshit, makes a place for wonder.

Wonder’s an important building block for growth and for Peace. So, shhhhhhhhh. see what you might be missing. Go look and see what’s hiding in the Peace and Quiet in this season of the Sacred Dark. This may be the work you’re born for!

Candlelit Peace

I don’t know what it is that candles do for me… or rather I know what, but I don’t know why.

OK, throw that all out. I know that sitting in a room with lit candles calms me. I also know that when I light them with intention, that I might be present, that I might be calmed, that I might appreciate the beauty of where I am (where I live!) and the gift of the dark.

Now as I mourn my sister’s passing. I create a small, quiet, beautifully lit oasis so that I might sit in contemplation.

To give myself that Peace, I must make my space beautiful, a place I want to be… The whole process helps, and indulges the luxury of time and of being exactly how I am, feeling what I feel and feeling wonderful in the midst of it.

I love the sweetness of the dark for all it offers me… May you find comfort in the dark as well. May we leave those sweet oases with Peace on our hearts and go back into the world as its envoys.

Old Friends, Sabbath, Peace

Open hands. Open heart. Love. Loss. Letting go.

For me, part of coping with the grief is culling. Culling my sister’s possessions for those that are too her to release, at least right now. Culling the heirlooms and helping them get to the right people. Culling my stuff to make room for the mementos.

Culling… Paring. Paring down to the essentials. Who am I? What do I need? What don’t I need.

Interestingly for me, culling comes to letting go of books. If i haven’t looked at them in 5 years, i probably don’t need them. If they’re romances… sure keep around a few for those moments when mindlessness is needed… but a few is the operative word. Reference books are confusing, what if I need them… and you’ve not used them.

But feng shui would tell me, let go, make room for something new. New thoughts, new directions (new mindlessness!).

And then find something sweet and read and read and read. There’s a good Sabbath occupation. And nothing like a good book to settle my mind. Nothing like the sound of two people sitting and reading to remind me of one thing I know Peace to be. Let it go to build it up… Peace. Peace and quiet. Nice. Open hands. Open heart.

Water Monster Peace

What if some of your most profound experiences were scams? I was just doing a little research about the teacher I mention in this musing. I have kept up over the years, but never seen these notices. Oh! the blessings of the internet…

And now the question emerges… if it was a scam and it worked, does that mean it has no value. Absolutely not… Was it merely suggestive healing? Is that different from spiritual healing? If you spend a week sitting on the ground doing meditation, dreaming and rituals, even if someone made them up, does it matter? Oh, that’s great. Ya gotta laugh you know.

But I love the notion of a benign Water Monster who thrives on my problems and burps back Peace … And today, I’m longing for a 10 day sit/walk/swim/peace and quiet by some beach somewhere with warm water and a benign monster to eat my problems… Oh, there’s work to be done… so I’ll get back to it, laughing all the way…

But not about the fact this woman didn’t have the courage to say she’d thought long and hard and that these were rituals she’d designed to work on these issues. Nothing wrong with designing rituals (says the ritualist), I do it all the time. I just haven’t usurped anyone’s heritage or claimed a tribal name (I don’t think Sister Fluff and the Goddess Gospel Hour comes from any other tradition…)

But again… pack up all your cares and woes, there you go, singing low, hey ho, monster!

Foggy Sabbath Peace

Mornings have been gentle lately, which is all to the good for me. I’m slower to embrace the day since it brings unwelcome realities. But the intensity of this time has also awakened in me the desire to sit quietly together under the arbor (bees buzzing overhead — the bees, oh, the precious bees), with a glass of cool mint tea, and consider how we might move forward in peace. The pages of the calendar turn, the seasons change, and Sabbath comes around again, with any luck, bringing with it peace and quiet.

So many of us have worked so hard, and now is the time to press the issue, to stand together. The next month and more will find our Jewish friends celebrating many holidays… peace, repentance, a new year, the harvest. The rest of the world would do well to pay attention… With my mind occasionally able to refocus, this is my prayer, that we make Peace, that we, each and every one, become Peacemakers.

But let us be gentle with ourselves today as the morning is gentle with the day. Enjoy September’s Mandala, Peace Arbor, about which Nanso (Nancy Cleaver, the artist) says: “Where are you standing in the arbor of peace? A tiny bird’s flitting view of light, of which it is made, was my inspiration for the squared spiral.”

Peace be with you. Peace be with us all. Peace be with us all because we make it so.

Succotash Sabbath Peace

It’s grey and mysterious out there today, and will burn off to a beautiful day. August at its finest.

I wish you meals full of the bounty of the season and dips in cool pools… A very blessed day of quiet and laughter… I’m sure it’s more about me that I’m longing for peace and quiet.

Succotash celebrates the abundance by mixing it all up. All those wonderful summer vegetables in a bright summer mix. I wish you that as well — and Peace, always Peace.

Sweet August Peace

I know, I know, dog days and all that… but I love the sheer laziness of August accompanied by peaches and watermelon and cantaloup and tomatoes and, and… I love the act of being present to what I eat and of carving out a bit of peace and quiet in a noisy, busy world.

And I admit that I speak as a non agricultural person. I’m not toiling in the noon-day sun for low wages. I am not a gardener (so not a gardener), so I am enjoying the fruits of someone else’s labor… if I really say grace for the food I eat, I must consider the well-being of everyone from local farmers to migrant farm-workers as I celebrate.

But there is also time, indeed there must be time for meditating on the deliciousness of a ripe peach whose juice drips down your face. There’s probably a poem in there… And there’s certainly a peach for me to eat! So I’ll go do that very thing. And I’ll think slow and Peaceful thoughts. You do the very same thing, too, ‘K? I’ve got a bowlful, if you want a peach, I’m happy to share.

And enjoy Nancy Cleaver’s incredibly beautiful mandala: Organic Peace, a water color she painted in 2009. She says this about the design: “This holds an ambiguous natural form for you to interpret. Is it a chrysanthemum, a shell, a seedpod, a cone? Whatever you see, it may perhaps be your totem for peace, calling you.”

Peace calls us and sometimes it just blesses us where we are. For me, August is one of those months.

Eternal Sabbath Peace

On a very hot summer day in plain view of the majestic mountain we released a small bit of our parents’ “till.” They were always sorry the mountain was wrapped in clouds when they had traveled there 20 years ago. Today the mountain was in full glory under a cloudless sky. Here their spirits will linger and rejoice in the beauty and the Peace and quiet. Gilead is many places, but the balm is constant.

Lingering on a beautiful day and rejoicing in the bounty is a pretty good idea. Resting in Peace is not something to be confined to the afterlife. We might do well to occasionally put our burdens down and rest in the Peace of Possibility. Wishing you a blessed Sabbath.

Quiet, Sabbath Peace

We started and ended our sail on Sunday… Both days had very busy mornings, but very relaxed afternoons…

But the trip was both an exercise and an embrace of the notion of a Sabbath. Partially because Deb isn’t completely recovered from last year’s treatment, partially, despite the fact that we’re both extroverts, neither one of us are joiners. Sometimes I think it’s because both of us find it difficult to do what extroverts MUST do in a crowd, listen to every single conversation. BOOM is the sound of an extrovert’s head exploding!

So we did very little. We certainly talked to people at meals. But we spent a lot of time sitting on one deck or another, inside or outside — depending on the weather or our need — just gazing at Nature’s Beauty and enjoying the Peace and Quiet. It was enough to make a soul sing… and it did. and from the looks of rapture on the faces of many people, mine was not the only one.

And so i wish you that, today, on this summer afternoon, a place to sit and gaze at Beauty. A place to still your mind and then heart and soul. Peace. Blessed be.

Resting Sabbath

At some point, we’ll gather and wonder what comes next. But not not yet. Today’s for the telling of stories, the reveling in new connections and the exalting in work well done. The UUCSV and its friends got on a bus, came to Staten Island with some elbow grease and more food than anyone could imagine and made Peace. We were taken on a tour of the affected areas. The need we encountered was staggering. The ongoing problems daunting. We didn’t change the world, but: There’s a little less mold and a lot more shelves. A kitchen remodeling moved along. Data entered. Calls made. Parties set up and carried out! Friends made, Heroes encountered. Labyrinths walked, Maypoles danced, Songs played and sung. And then they got back on the bus exhausted and happy.

Today, we’ll rest and reminisce. Thanks to everyone who participated. Thanks to everyone who gave. (it’s still not to late, go to Love Flows if you’re able to share some resources with people so hard hit by a storm.) Three of us will provide the service for our host church as one more chance for people to sit back and put their feet up. What happened, happened because you participated.

Thank you. I’m sure I’ll be finding new things to give thanks for about this trip for a long time.

But you know what? I’m a tired girl… and other people were doing great things in the world while we were working on this little one. So sit back, put your feet up and relax. Enjoy the Sabbath. Yesterday was all about the hard work. Now, we could all use a little Peace and quiet.

Sacred Village

Building a World of Peace, Village by Sacred Village.

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