Tag Archives: spirituality

Photography Quote of the Day

Posted on April 20, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

“Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.” ― Lao Tzu To Download free inspiration and life quotes on nature photos please visit: Pi Photography and Fine Art

Source: Photography Quote of the Day

When I think about times that I have felt strong, it has been when I felt deeply loved by someone. At our wedding, I stood up as the procession song began and I shook. When I turned and saw Kathy, I was calm. Perhaps, her love found its way up the aisle of the church that day.

When I think about times that I had courage, it is because I loved someone deeply. As parents and grandparents, we feel that unconditional love and it gives us courage act in ways that seem out of character. On Friday night, while babysitting our grandson, him and I ran around the basement laughing and chasing each other. I had the courage to do things I had not done for years in a safe and private setting.

Thomas Merton wrote that we call it falling in love, because we open ourselves to the risk of being hurt. What if the love is not returned? Love that gives strength and courage is not something that is fleeting and superficial. It runs deep, coursing through our veins and between people. Love helps us remain mindful, attentive, and sensitive to others who are in our lives. More importantly love is felt by others who are not immediately present.

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Posted in Mindful Life, Photography, Reflective Moments, Uncategorized and tagged creativity, Lao Tzu, Mindful Practice, mindfulness, Photography Quote of the Day, PI Photography and Fine Art, spirituality, teacher as transformer, Thomas Merton. Bookmark the permalink.

Love Does That

Posted on April 19, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

I have not used Meister Eckhart in my writing and what little I know about his work comes indirectly through reading others such as Thomas Merton and Richard Rohr.

His poetry follows the mystical line of his other writing, exploring spiritual questions that are challenging to explore. The monk in the poem is a whisperer who for a few moments lifts the worries from the little burro. He shares a pear, rubs her/his ears, looks into his/her eyes as if the he might see the burro’s soul, and offers kindness to the burro.

How often do we find ourselves worrying about things that only bother us? How tired we feel in those times. Sometimes, we pause and lift the burdens that weigh down our minds and spirits. Other times, we have our whisperers who share love with us and help lift life’s burdens. Similar to the burro, we are free to laugh, even for a few seconds. Love is the balm for our tired spirits.

All day long a little burro labors, sometimes
with heavy loads on her back and sometimes just with worries
about things that bother only
burros.

And worries, as we know, can be more exhausting
than physical labor.

Once in a while a kind monk comes
to her stable and brings
a pear, but more
than that,

he looks into the burro’s eyes and touches her ears

and for a few seconds the burro is free
and even seems to laugh,

because love does
that.

Love frees.

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talisman

Posted on April 17, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

When we pray, the words are an amulet for someone to wear. Suheir Hammad suggested the words remind us there is a divine space in each of us, waiting to be brought out as we write and speak. Inside each of us, there is a space of strength and courage we can offer to others as we write and repeat the poetic words.

In silence that endures within each of us, we discover the gestures and words of prayer and poetry another has written and spoken. A prayer reaches out to the other and adds strength to their living in moments of hardship, reminding them they are not alone. It is in those moments that something stirs gently and unexpectedly in us, reminding us we are not alone and perhaps a smile appears similar to the sun and moon’s warmth.

During those moments, we find the words written and spoken in silence. It is essential we set aside the busyness of daily living and listen attentively for those words to bring the god out in each of us.

it is written
the act of writing is
holy words are
sacred and your breath
brings out the
god in them
i write these words
quickly repeat them
softly to myself
this talisman for you
fold this prayer
around your neck fortify
your back with these
whispers
may you walk ever
loved and in love
know the sun
for warmth the moon
for direction
may these words always
remind you your breath
is sacred words
bring out the god
in you

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Posted in Community, Leadership, Mindful Life, Poetry, Reflective Moments, Sabbath and tagged community, conversational journey, Mindful Practice, mindfulness, poetry, prayer, servant-leadership, spirituality, Suheir Hammad, talisman, teacher as transformer. Bookmark the permalink.

Walking Meditation With Thich Nhat Hanh

Posted on April 14, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Thich Nhat Hanh wrote about an experience while visiting Seoul, South Korea. He walked with a large crowd and felt tired. When he meditated on his walking and the earth beneath his feet, he felt lighter. The earth supported him and he walked tirelessly. Tess Gallagher writes about a similar experience.

I often take for granted people and things that give me comfort and support. I take for granted the earth and how it effortlessly supports me as I walk, but I also take for granted the steps I take in moving the mountain.

Through mindfulness and attention, I live with the ebbs and flows of energy that I experience in daily life. We become part of the world and it becomes part of each of us.

Fifty of us follow him loosely
up the mountain at Deer Park Monastery.
We are in the slow motion of a dream
lifting off the dreamer’s brow. Steps
into steps and the body rising out
of them like smoke from a fire
with many legs. Gradually the flames
die down and the earth is finally under us.
Inside the mountain a centipede crawls
into no-up, no-down.

Our meditations
waver and recover us, waver
and reel us in to our bodies
like fish willing at last to take on the joy
of being fish, in or out of the water.
When we gather at last at the summit
and sit with him
we know we have moved the mountain
to its top as much as it carried us
deeply into each step.

Going down is the same.
We breathe and step. Breathe,
and step. A many-appendaged being
in and out of this world. No use
telling you about peace attained.
Get out of your feet.
Your breath. Enter
the mountain.

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Hope

Posted on April 12, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

The line that stands out in the following poem is the one about hopelessness being that when we turn our back on the world it is snatched away. Czeslaw Milosz wrote wonderfully and tied belief and hope together.

The French phenomenologist and philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty wrote about how we perceive the world. What exists between us and the world is our flesh, which forms a sensuous boundary between the internal and external worlds we simultaneously co-inhabit.

It is through all our senses we experience and remember the world. In turn, it experiences and remembers us, but we have to believe it does. There is a fidelity, a trust, that exists for those experiences to be true and believed.

We bind ourselves to the world, the universe, and the divine, not through blindness, but through unproveable faith. Paradoxically, it is through believing we do not have to prove this faith that we accept the world and it, along with others and things exist even when we do not see them, even when they are not immediately within the range of our senses.

Hope is with you when you believe
The earth is not a dream but living flesh,
That sight, touch, and hearing do not lie,
That all things you have ever seen here
Are like a garden looked at from a gate.

You cannot enter. But you’re sure it’s there.
Could we but look more clearly and wisely
We might discover somewhere in the garden
A strange new flower and an unnamed star.

Some people say we should not trust our eyes,
That there is nothing, just a seeming,
These are the ones who have no hope.
They think that the moment we turn away,
The world, behind our backs, ceases to exist,
As if snatched up by the hands of thieves.

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The Sea Question

Posted on April 10, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

We don’t think of those inanimate objects, such as the sea, asking us questions. They do in indirect ways and when we sit a listen. It takes quiet patience to hear the questions and answers, if they are forthcoming

Elizabeth Smither wrote about how the sea asks those indirect questions. It does so by changing colour, watching the tide and wave actions, and how the pebbles move. When I am mindful and sensitive to the world outside my self and beyond my self, I understand it in relationship to me. It does not exist without me and I do not exist without it.

Through mindfulness, the world teaches me and I learn from it. What changes in the continuous flow of time that I miss, regardless of how attentive I am?

The sea asks “How is your life now?”
It does so obliquely, changing colour.
It is never the same on any two visits.

It is never the same in any particular
Only in generalities: tide and such matters
Wave height and suction, pebbles that rattle.

It doesn’t presume to wear a white coat
But it questions you like a psychologist
As you walk beside it on its long couch.

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Freedom…

Posted on April 5, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

Life in itself is an empty canvas, it becomes whatsoever you paint on it. You can paint misery, you can paint bliss. This freedom is your glory. ~ ` ~ Osho &nbs…

Source: Freedom…

There are series of pictures and quotes in this post about freedom. Life happens to us and there is no question of that. When we have freedom, we respond to what happens.

Others’ freedom depend on our love in ways that they know they are free. Love does not place conditions. Thomas Merton argued we call it falling in love because we open up, make ourselves vulnerable, and risk being hurt. The opposite is also true. When the love is returned without condition to us, it is a great gift.

With the gifts of love and freedom intertwined, we fly with the wings we receive. We attend to and mind the others in our lives and even those we do not meet. Love and freedom resonate beyond our horizons.

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To Myself

Posted on April 3, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

In being mindful, I think the person I overlook sometimes is myself. When I mind my self, I mind others better and I offer a better version of my self to them. In this way, mind is a verb. I attend to and care for my self and the other.

As well, myself is two words and not one. The self I mind and attend is real, even if it is mine. Better takes on an ambiguous meaning. What does it mean to do something better? I leave certainty behind, because better does not come with fixed criteria.

W. S. Merwin wrote this poem about being mindful to one’s self. In other words, to fully mind my self. When I fully mind my self, I continuously find my self anew, even in those moments I feel lost.

Even when I forget you
I go on looking for you
I believe I would know you
I keep remembering you
sometimes long ago but then
other times I am sure you
were here a moment before
and the air is still alive
around where you were and I
think then I can recognize
you who are always the same
who pretend to be time but
you are not time and who speak
in the words but you are not
what they say you who are not
lost when I do not find you

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Today, Like Every Other Day

Posted on April 2, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

For me, there are poets, like Rumi, whose poetry stand the test of time. After almost a century, the poetic text lives and remains ambiguous searching for meaning.

Now, I don’t play a musical instrument. I sing poorly. I have two left feet, so dancing is out of the question. What Rumi calls on each of us to do, in our particular and unique fashion, is to express ourselves and be creative.

Thich Nhat Hanh said that the extraordinary is found in the ordinary, the ordinary tasks such as doing dishes and enjoying a cup of tea. As we do, we meditate about those who enrich our lives through their efforts. We celebrate people who contribute to our lives in a human and humane manner.

Yes, I do wake up empty, but it is an emptiness that can be filled with each way I celebrate my humanness.

Today, like every other day, we wake up empty

and frightened. Don’t open the door of your study
and begin reading. Take down a musical instrument.

Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.

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Lost

Posted on March 31, 2016 by ivonprefontaine

I sometimes feel lost in the world, without bearings. David Wagoner counseled that when we feel lost to stop and listen to the world, as if it were the forest and a powerful stranger able to speak to us.

When I stop and pray, I ask someone for help, but, if I rush on, without listening, the prayer cannot be answered. I pose a question that I cannot answer. Prayer is not just speaking. My heart opens and receives what is returned to me.

Is it in the form of words? Or, is it the gentle breath that is hardly perceptible? When I am mindful and listen to listen, I intuitively sense differences. Mindfulness becomes an attentive and sensitive way of life, as opposed to just happening.

Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you,
If you leave it you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.