Unfortunately, change and forgiveness do not come easily for me, but ANY willingness to let go inevitably comes from pain; and the desire to change and forgive changes you, and jiggles the spirit, gets to it somehow, to the deepest, hardest, most ruined parts. And then Spirit expands, because that is its nature, and it brings along the body, and finally, the mind.
That which is at the center of the Sacred Space within my heart, is the very same which is in the sun, which is in the earth, in the heart of every living being.
When each day is sacred When each hour is sacred When each instant is sacred Earth and you, space and you hearing the sacred through time You'll reach the fields of light.
Soul requirements casll for silence, sacred time alone in heart space and stillness. A balanced life, engenders harmony of gody, mind, emotions, and soul in work, prayer, and recreation in the outer world; re-creation in silence and solitude, inwardly at home with Divine Love. Let Wisdom teach and illuminate the way! Cherish your times in sacred space with silence and solitude.
Steeping ourselves in a place, simmering in its bounties, celebrating its wonders, and loving its peculiarities are necessary steps on a spiritual journey. We often take for granted the places where we work and play. To get to know them again, or perhaps for the first time, involves acts of consecration and imagination. Or as Wendell Berry puts it: "My most inspiring thought is that this place, if I am to live well in it, requires and deserves a lifetime of the most careful attention."
The sacred landscape is a window into the other worlds. It is a place where beings encounter each other, and meet themselves. Be open. If you see something, pay attention!
Landscape is more than flat land covered by floodwater, the seeping of peat bogs, a river of liquid pewter viewed from a tower. It's an influence on what a person values, what she is willing to sacrifice or argue for. The interior landscape of a soul is, in part, a reflection of the exterior landscape.
After one hundred days of confinement following a bone marrow transplant, I rejoiced in taking short walks to a nearby park. The uncertainty of my survival made every blade of grass gorgeous in its green intensity, lifting itself up, doing its part to make the world more beautiful. Every breeze touching my neck was a gift, revitalizing me. I looked a the world tenderly, intensely, gratefully.
"Is there enough Silence for the Word to be heard?"
In the silence we can discover our own unique soul-song of the heart. As we listen to the music of the world's soul-songs, we can begin to feel the quickening and resonance of our own. Silently, we may experience moments filled with light. Be still. Simply BE. And see.
Every soul is born out of silence, dies back into silence and during its life span is surrounded by silence. Silence allows the sound to be. It is an intrinsic but unmanifested part of every sound, every musical note, every word. The Unmanifested is present in the world as silence. Thnis is why it has b een said that nothing in this world is so like God as silence.
That which cannot be expressed otherwise can only be told through music. A thought, which seems common place in its analysis, acquires a depper sense in music.
We can think of ourselves as musical instruments that imprint the world in a unique way. Our body is the instrument, our nerves are the strings, and the musician is our spirit. When in a music store, if yuou pluck a string on a guitar, all the other guitars in the room will vibrate to that tone. What type of music are you making?
The monk made the bamboo come alive, capturing the sounfds of the universe and bringing them into the room. Long, deep, haunting tones vibrated in my chest. The notest demanded introspection. The noise of the rain somehow accentuated the silence between each phrase, adding an inconceivable dimension to the music.
I am in need of music that would flow Over my fretful, feeling fingertips. Over my bitter-tainted, trembling lips, With melody, deep, clear, and liquid-slow.
Oh, for the healing swaying, old and low, Of some song sun to rest the tired dead, A song to fall like water on my head, And over quivering limbs, dream flushed to glow.
As I passed the tall spruce, it suddenly came alive with song. Startled, I stopped to listedn. Deep inside the thickly branched tree the sparrows had been awakened by some inner alarm clock and began heralding tghe dawn with their symphony cheeps, quickly filling the gray day with the sparkle of their voices. I stood there amazed, my heart transformed. A smile came as I pondered that usually silent tree now filled with hidden music.
Don't we all need a tree full of sparrow cheeps to lift our hearts into hope and to remind us of the surprising beauty of life!
How many songs I have I cannot tell you. I keep no count of such things. There are so manyu occasions in one's life when a joy or a sorrow is felt in suich a way tthat the desire comes to sing; and so I only know that I have many songs. All my being is song, and I sing as I draw breath.... It is just a necfessary for me to sing as it is to breath.
What can soothe the soul as much as the grace of music? Music allows us to express and deal with our feelings constructively, lifting them to a new place, a new level of integration. The enchantment of music helps free the soul to sing, and its energy becomes an infectious catalyst to change. On the wings of a beautiful melody, suddenly we feel different, ready to move forward.
~ from RISE UP WITH A LISTENING HEART by the Monks of New Skete
By now, every thermometer I have has burst at temperatures over 130 degrees. The abbot of the monastery suggested I make a journey up to a cave in the mountains with an elderly monk as guide. We had to walk barefoot as we were walking on holy ground. Under my breath I muttered and grumbled. The monk was well aware of me, and as I began to listen to what he was murmuring, I discovered it was melodic. He was actually singing a song of praise for the wonder and beauty of the day as I was accursing!
On a sould discovery journey in the desert, our group included Miguel Gruntlein, who had studied the Peruvian flute. Early each morning I would hear Miguel somehwere near the camp playing the most serene song to gree the dawn with the same haunting tune; as we moved camp, the tune changed. When asked, Miguel said he was playing the songs of the canyon. Each place has its own song and reflects a unique facet of his soul that comes alive in the particular wild place he visits, a conversation between Miguel and the wild.
Become more and more acquainted with your body on all its subtle levels, the fine vibrations which really are music, because when we talk of things created, they are only vibrations, nothing else, energy in movement and matter. In poetic language we can say the world is created by music. As we are the world, the universe, all the music of the universe is in our body.
The voice of the solar wind -- aptly named "chorus" -- is both ethereal and haunting. You can hear echoes of crickets and snatches of whole song in this celestial starry music that bathes our planet. Everything is in vibratory relationship with everything else.
From the "strings" to the fluctuating pulses of cosmic radiationb that attend the expansion of the universe, there is a song that sounds through the fabric of our physical universe. The music of life is heard everywhere. It is we who fail to hear the music.
~ from NAVIGATING THE TIDES OF CHANGE by David La Chapelle
"Is there enough Silence for the Word to be heard?"
May you be blessed with deep peace, dear friends. May you come to know the Oneness of All in the Silenc,e the Still-point of pure Being! As we unite in the Ocean of Oneness, our cup of Love is fille and overflows to others.
