her name was Lung Ta, and still i trust, the Great Giver of Gifts.

So. I've been thinking a lot about my car…and how before I even drove it off the lot, I remember praying…and offering it as a blessing to the Giver of Gifts…saying, "This car is a miracle…and it is Yours. This car does not belong to me. This car belongs to You. And I am so very honoured to make use of it. And so, I consecrate it to you. Watch over it, and guide me therein to do your will." And I named my car, Lung Ta, which is to say…it embodied for me, the Great Spirit of the Windhorse…and I knew each day that my car belonged to God, and that its function was to carry me to my next level. Both metaphorically, and literally, she was my Windhorse Rising. And so, though it was a great, great grief…to…in one split second, see her beautiful, striped bonnet hood crumple over and over and over again [as it replayed in my head]…I knew even then…with such an odd sense of peace, that I could trust, even this was a gift…this was somehow her destiny, and part of her plan to bring me to the next great height in my own journey. And I remember this, as I gear up each morning…come wind, come rain…to ride to work. With each turn of my bicycle wheels and with the sweat of my brow…I trust the good that is inherent in this seeming grief. I have lost so, so much in my lifetime, and know that the more we hold on to things with clenched fists, the less we can either give or receive. And I know…true miracles can occur when we are stripped of our own glory…when we possess no strength in and of ourselves. These are the things of the Spirit, and they are more sure…and greater than we could even ask or imagine. [So even in her passing, I trust]

i think...what i am trying to say, is so beautifully illustrated as thus. it is so very good to remember.

capuchin I by debra swartzendruber

The king and the beggar's gift.

A difficult or unwanted thing can turn out to be a great gift. Frequently we receive unknown gifts in disguise. There is a wonderful old story told of a young king who took over a kingdom. He was loved before he became a king, and his subjects were delighted when he was finally crowned. They brought him many different gifts. After the coronation, the new king was at supper in the palace. Suddenly, there was a knock at the door. The servants went out to discover an old man shabbily dressed, looking like a beggar. He wanted to see the king. The servants did their best to dissuade him, but to no avail. The king came out to meet him. The old man praised the king, saying how wonderful he was and how delighted everyone in the kingdom was to have him as king. He had brought the king the gift of a melon. The king hated melons. But being kind to the old man, he took the melon, thanked him, and the old man went away happy. The king went indoors and gave the melon to his servants to throw out in the back garden.

The next week at the same time, there was another knock at the door. The king was summoned again and the old man praised the king and offered him another melon. The king took the melon and said good-bye to the old man. Once again, he threw the melon out the back door. This continued for several weeks. The king was too kind to confront the old man or belittle the generosity of the gift that he brought.

Then, one evening, just as the old man was about to hand the melon to the king, a monkey jumped down from a portico in the palace and knocked the melon from the old man's hand. The melon shattered in pieces all over the front of the palace. When the king looked, he saw a shower of diamonds flying from the heart of the melon. Eagerly, he checked the garden at the back of the palace. There all the melons had melted around a little hillock of jewels.

The moral of this story is that sometimes awkward situations, problems, or difficulties are really disguised opportunities for growth.

Very often at the heart of the difficulty, there is the light of a great jewel. It is wise to learn to embrace with hospitality that which is awkward and difficult.

- excerpted from "Anam Cara" by John O'Donohue

what is. [for now, we know in part]

"Our ordinary waking consciousness is but one form of consciousness.
All around us lie infinite worlds,
separated only by the thinnest veils."

- William James -

to keep opening wider my heart.

OPEN

It is a small step to remember
how life led to this
moment's hesitation.

How the door to the deeper world
opens, letting the body fall at last,
toward the few griefs it can call its own.

Oh yes, I know. Our wings catch fire
in that downward flight
and we come to earth afraid
we can never fly again.

But then we always knew
heaven would be a desperate place.
Everything you desired coming
in one fearful moment
to greet you.

Your full presence only in rest
and the love that asks nothing.
The rest where you lie down
and are no longer found at all.

- DAVID WHYTE -

listening to that big, full moon.

i am thinking a lot about how we are more and more illuminated...we are able to reflect more light, the more transparent and open we become...as empty vessels we are able to serve...we are able to be filled, the more we are poured out.

living fully [is honoring the great sacrament].

A beautiful phrase of Hegel's is...
"Die Wunden des Geistes heilen, ohne dass Narben bleiben";

"The wounds of the spirit heal and leave no scars."

There is healing for each of our wounds, but this healing is waiting in the indirect, oblique, and nonanalytic side of our nature.

We need to be mindful of where we are damaged,
Then invite our deeper soul in its night-world to heal this wounded tissue,
renew us,
and bring us back into unity.

If we approach our hurt indirectly and kindly,
it will heal.

Creative expectation brings you healing and renewal.
If you could trust your soul,
you would receive every blessing you require.

Life itself is the
great sacrament
through which we are
wounded and healed.

If we live everything,
life will be faithful to us.

- from "Anam Cara" by John O'Donohue -

like eleanor said.

so...i've begun riding my bike to work...not just as an eco-responsible, cost-effective practice...but now, as my car was recently totaled, as a necessity. it's one thing to ride as a choice...which i had done...regularly...and that is certainly something to feel good about.

but it's another thing altogether to ride because you have to.

when you ride because you have to, it doesn't matter how far you have to go. it doesn't matter if you're tired. it doesn't matter if you have a lot of things to carry. it doesn't matter if you're behind. it doesn't matter if you don't want to. it doesn't matter if you're sick. it doesn't matter if it's frighteningly dark. it doesn't matter if it's raining, or hailing, or sweltering hot. you simply must do.

and there's naturally an amount of forethought and planning involved in order to consider every possibility. but the thing is, the reward is such a sweet, sweet knowing...of knowing you can test your limits and push yourself through every and any obstacle that may arise along the path. it is the opportunity to become intimately acquainted with your resilience...and ultimately to know...without a shadow of a doubt...that:

you must [and can] do the thing you thought you could not do.

more beautiful with salt.

metempsychosis

Some stories last many centuries,
others only a moment.
All alter over that lifetime like beach-glass,
grow distant and more beautiful with salt.

Yet even today, to look at a tree
and ask the story Who are you? is to be transformed.

There is a stage in us where each being, each thing, is a mirror.

Then the bees of self pour from the hive-door,
ravenous to enter the sweetness of flowering nettles and thistle.

Next comes the ringing a stone or violin or empty bucket
gives off —
the immeasurable’s continuous singing,
before it goes back into story and feeling.

In Borneo, there are palm trees that walk on their high roots.
Slowly, with effort, they lift one leg then another.

I would like to join that stilted transmigration,
to feel my own skin vertical as theirs:
an ant-road, a highway for beetles.

I would like not minding, whatever travels my heart.
To follow it all the way into leaf-form, bark-furl, root-touch,
and then keep walking, unimaginably further.

- Jane Hirshfield -