I trust you have been finding your way this summer (or winter) season with its many rhythms, making space to tend to what it is that you need to stay connected to your Wisdom rhythms and path. Rhythms are an essential element of our lives. . . the rhythms of our human (or creaturely) self with our personality and temperament, alongside our divine self (the deepest Self) with the ability to see beyond this world, alongside the rhythms of the seasons, the sun and the moon, the liturgical year, the planets, and so on. Learning to listen into these different rhythms and allowing them to be in relationship with one another is part of our work. Perhaps Wisdom rhythms could be understood as anything that helps us learn to tune into the foundational beat of our heart, the exquisite organ of spiritual perceptivity that it is, and to stay connected to its knowing and voice in the midst of whatever rhythms our creaturely selves may need and that life requires of us at any given time. Sometimes it can be difficult to stay connected to that deep and steady rhythm because every other rhythm is louder or more distracting. Other times it can be very easy to remain in resonance with that core and sturdy rhythm. No matter what we are faced with, the rhythm deep within beats on and either we will find it or it will find us, if that is our wish. May we all continue to learn to hear what the ear of our heart knows when we engage our Wisdom rhythms. With Love, Heather p.s. I know I mentioned the emails would be more sporadic this summer and wanted to make sure you know this is the first one for the month of August. I look forward to being back with you in the pauses tomorrow. Thank you Catherine, Joy, Faye, Lacey, Ali, Tom, and Chris for facilitating while I was away!
Some of the Readings From the Pauses Monday with Joy “First and foremost, you must listen to your own rhythm, and try to live in accordance with it. Be attentive to what emerges from deep down. Often, our actions are only imitations, fulfillment of an assumption of duty, or a reflection of what we believe a human being ‘should’ be. But the only certainty we may have about our life and our deeds can only spring from the very depth of our being.” — Etty Hillesum
Wednesday with Ali
“Our Yet Again Yes”
For years I had a drawer holding only broken things:
a hand-thrown mug, stripped of its handle;
shimmering shards of porcelain bowl.
treasured things, broken beyond use, beauty-full yet.
what to cling to, and when to let go?
when light disperses, whiteness shatters
and a kaleidoscope of color spills out.
some shatterings are necessary
and some we only barely, maybe, survive
and some we can’t, or don’t, or won’t
but stars, too, are born from shattering
they offer their sonorous invocation:
shine forth you busted open burned out
spilling over holy messy broken beauty!
this blessing is for when even the most determined
individual efforts, my love, can carry you no further
nor get you any freer, nor any more alive.
surrender, my love, only life force required.
shed what no longer serves you, or never did.
hold close only the tender courage
of your yet again Yes.
yes: we love our broken hearts open again.
yes: we cry the world alive again.
yes: we salve shattered shards soft again.
— anna k blaedel, Held: Blessings for the Depths
Thursday with Faye “The great discovery of contemporary science is that the universe is not simply a place, but a story—a story in which we are immersed, to which we belong, and out of which we arose. This story has the power to awaken us more deeply to who we are. For just as the Milky Way is the universe in the form of a galaxy, and an orchid is the universe in the form of a flower, we are the universe in the form of a human. And every time we are drawn to look up into the night sky and reflect on the awesome beauty of the universe, we are actually the universe reflecting on itself. And this changes everything.” — Brian Swimme and Mary Evelyn Tucker, Journey of Universe Friday with Faye “Remember” Remember the sky that you were born under, know each of the star’s stories. Remember the moon, know who she is. Remember the sun’s birth at dawn, that is the strongest point of time. Remember sundown and the giving away to night. Remember your birth, how your mother struggled to give you form and breath. You are evidence of her life, and her mother’s, and hers. Remember your father. He is your life, also. Remember the earth whose skin you are: red earth, black earth, yellow earth, white earth brown earth, we are earth. Remember the plants, trees, animal life who all have their tribes, their families, their histories, too. Talk to them, listen to them. They are alive poems. Remember the wind. Remember her voice. She knows the origin of this universe. Remember you are all people and all people are you. Remember you are this universe and this universe is you. Remember all is in motion, is growing, is you. Remember language comes from this. Remember the dance language is, that life is. Remember. — Joy Harjo
From the Daily Contemplative Pauses
Tuesday with Lacey
I am, you anxious one. Don’t you sense me ready to break into being at your touch? My murmurings surround you like shadowy wings. Can’t you see me standing before you cloaked in stillness? Hasn’t my longing ripened in you from the beginning as fruit ripens on the branch?
I am the dream you are dreaming.
When you want to awaken, I am that wanting:
I grow strong in the beauty you behold.
And with the silence of stars I enfold
your cities made by time.
— R.M. Rilke
Wednesday with Lacey
"Ultimately speaking there is just one thing that's happening, that the infinite presence of God is presence-ing itself, or is pouring itself out, giving itself away whole and complete in and as the gift and the miracle of our very presence, the presence of others, the presence of all things in our nothingness without God. That's the mystery. Ultimately speaking, that's what's happening. And since love is the overflowing fullness of presence, we can say, just one thing is happening - the infinite love of God is pouring itself out in and as the intimate immediacy of our very life. So, love then, this infinite love of God, is our origin, the infinite love of God is our sustaining ground. . . our destiny, our eternal destiny."
― James Finley
Thursday with
—
Friday with
―
Saturday with
—
Sunday with
—
Comments