Category Archives: Leadership

The World Goes On

via The World Goes On

With his post, Eddie provided me with an opportunity to share and reflect on a Mary Oliver‘s poem Wild Geese.

The poem is about belonging to the larger family we each live within. It is also about being who we are and not fretting about what that might mean. Certainly, it is essential to living to reflect on who we are and who we are becoming, but we sometimes we let this become greater than the life we are living.

I think to experience the world and living most fully I need to be present and mindful of what I am experiencing and letting go in each moment. This is challenging, as the human mind scurries here and there, but, when I let go and am present, the riches are enriching and add to the becoming in ways I cannot predict and caculate in advance.

Moon Rise

I took this picture at Radium Hot Springs during an evening walk while on retreat there. I was surrounded by all the beauty nature has to offer in these moments.

New Beginnings

via New Beginnings

Wildflower Women posted a lovely quote from Mary Oliver ushering in 2019.

We celebrate moments as if they are unique to a particular time. To be present and live in the world fully, perhaps each moment is a New Year flowing endlessly in the form of a river.

As I embrace the present moment, I kiss possibilities of what will be in the following moment without knowing this in advance.

Whitehead contended the present moment is holy ground where the past and future are always meeting and becoming whole. Holy, whole, and healing are linked etymologically.

Kathy took this photo as we travelled to BC just over a year ago.

The Wisdom of the Universe in a Blade of Grass

via The Wisdom of the Universe in a Blade of Grass

Strawberry Indigo posted a wonderful piece that included some of my favourite writers: Walt Whitman, Mary Oliver, Thich Nhat Hanh, and Rabindranath Tagore each writing about a blade of grass and its wisdom.

It reminded me of the passage from Matthew 6:26 about lilies of the field, which exist for the sole purpose of their existence: “consider the lilies of the field, how they grow.They don’t toil, neither do they spin.” Other writers have made reference to lilies of the field. For example, Edith Wharton critiqued the rich and famous for their idle ways.

To be is to live fully and experience in living. It is to be present, living in the moment and mindful of the world as we experience it.

Daffodils, Lake, and Mountain in Glacier

Kathy took this picture of flowers, grass, trees, a lake, and mountains in Glacier National Park. Each of them just exists to be in the world, filling a particular role. One role is to make the world a better and beautiful place.

Feel a River

via Feel a River

Eddie shares a quote from Rumi. It reminded joy flows like a river through life. It takes on meaning in ways I cannot anticipate.

Fraser River Near Headwaters

I took this picture of Kathy and the Fraser River in East Central British Columbia. Around the bend is a waterfall one can hear, but not see from this vantage. The river flows.

 

Behind your image…

via Behind your image…

Natalie‘s beautiful image and John O’Donohue‘s wonderful blessings serve as reminders that life is to be lived in extra-sensory ways. It is about the mystery we cannot see, touch, and feel about how a flower simply exists to be a flower..

When I have faith in more than what I experience and the mysteries of what that means in life, I feel free to live life and embrace the mysteries of living. Sometimes, it is the simplest forms that escape our attention. It reminds me of the following quote from Meister Eckhardt, which can mean more in a person’s than I can ever know.

“If the only prayer you said was thank you, that would be enough.”

Thanking others as part of being alive and aware of their presence is a simple and profound prayer.

Trusting Love

via Trusting Love

This is a wonderful post about love Charmed Chaos

Love is what makes us human, brings us together, and allows each of us to grow. For humans, love is part of who we are and is instinctual. It does not have to be taught, unlike hate and war.

I used an activity, Culture of Peace, and had students describe the difference between a culture of hate and one of peace. We filled whiteboards describing a Culture of Peace and the conversation ended quickly about one of hate. It affirmed my faith in children and the role of love in their lives.

Paulo Coehlo asks and answers how love comes to be in our lives.

How does light enter a house? If the windows are open. How does light enter a human? If the door of love is open.

Be The Tree #poem

via Be The Tree #poem

I tried to reblog this wonderful poem by Didi, but, for the second time in the past week, I was unable to do so. Instead, I will press it as my sharing for today.

This wonderful poem reminded me of Matthew’s verse (6:28) about lilies of the field growing for the sake of being and making the world a better place without doing so consciously.

The line that stood out for me was life is “not a competetion, a judgement, or a race.” At times. my life and who I am calls me to just be and not plan, worry, and overthink what that means. It means to live meditatively and be in the present moment, mindful and attentive to the world.

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Kathy took this picture while driving through Glacier National Park. The trees add depth, contrast, and boundaries. Taken-for-granted are the trees, which are the boundary between the road and valley in the forefront.

Gallery Hop – I, Too, Sing America: The Harlem Renaissance at 100 Mural Series

via Gallery Hop – I, Too, Sing America: The Harlem Renaissance at 100 Mural Series

This post is a bit longer than ones I usually press, but it brought back memories of teaching.

I taught Language Arts and, as a result, poetry. I was drawn to Langston Hughes who was critical in the Harlem Renaissance, although he was not originally from New York. He was from Joplin, Missouri, found his way to Harlem, and added a wonderful voice through poetry to the Renaissance.

One of the murals in the post is of Richard Pryor who would have begun his career in the latter stages of Langston Hughes’ life. I did not think of it that way until today as I looked at the post and realized there was an overlap in their careers.

Like Hughes, Pryor was not born in New York, but moved there from Illinois. I watched Pryor on the Ed Sullivan Show in the late 1960’s, enjoying his humour and social critique.

I leave you with a Langston Hughes poem: Dreams. I shared this one with my students each year, reminding them to have dreams and chase those dreams.

Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.

 

The Journey Within

via The Journey Within

Along with two quotes from Rumi and Kahil Gibran, Karen offers four practices to move towards the journey within.

Healing, which shares etymology with whole, healthy, and holistic, needs patience to achieve. There are no quick fixes.

I find an axiom that serves me well is to think of my meditative practices as practice. It is in those moments that the struggle sometimes becomes clearer, making my life wholer. Other times, I fall short.

I told hockey players to take risks in practice and the same can be said for meditation and other practices to make myself whole and healthy. Another practice is walking, which I treat like a form of meditation. I try to remember I am part of nature, not outside it. This helps make me feel more whole.

Let yourself go!

Jasper Trail

A Simpler Life

Kathy and I are doing some house cleaning and it is interesting what we find.

Kathy looked through some papers we had stored and found poetry I wrote in 1969, in Grade 10. There are things that are consistent in life and one of them is seeking moments of solitude and silence, which I wrote about in this poem. I took liberties and edited the poem, orginally called The Simple Life.

It is good to be alone at times,

Sheltered by comforting trees,

The wind singing a song,

Here, I experience freedom and peace,

For the moment, worries set aside.

Minnows dart at the water’s edge,

Dancing between light and shadows,

Seemingly, without a care,

There, they experience home’s safety;

Its primal call.

Here, this is me,

I experience a simpler life;

An unseen hand beckons me,

I wave to this simpler life,

Enjoying it each time I return.

I took this picture in Waterton Lake National Park several years ago. I came around a corner and there was a doe and two fawn. I could have touched the one fawn it was so close, but it was separated from its mother. I stood as still as possible, moving slowly to get the camera ready. The mother whistled to the one fawn and waited until the young one found its way over to her, back to the safety of where it belonged.