Category: Be fully present

Love does that

Karl Duffy3 Comments
File:Donkeys at Dooks Mountain - geograph.org.uk - 647635.jpg
All day long the little donkey labours, sometimes
with heavy loads on her back and sometimes just with worries
about the things that bother only donkeys.
 
And worries, as we know, can be more exhausting
than physical labour.
 
Once in a while a kind monk comes
to her stable and brings a pear, but more
than that,
he looks into the donkey’s eyes and touches her ears
 
and for a few seconds the donkey is free
and even seems to laugh,
 
because love does that.
Love frees.
Meister Eckhart
photo dave whalley

….. A new month – another invitation to notice.

Karl Duffy1 Comment

File:Goldfinches at Audubon Dodson Road Nature Trail.jpg

Oh do you have time
to linger
for just a little while
out of your busy

and very important day
for the goldfinches
that have gathered
in a field of thistles

for a musical battle,
to see who can sing
the highest note,
or the lowest,

or the most expressive of mirth,
or the most tender?
Their strong, blunt beaks
drink the air

as they strive
melodiously
not for your sake
and not for mine

and not for the sake of winning
but for sheer delight and gratitude –
believe us, they say,
it is a serious thing

just to be alive
on this fresh morning
in the broken world.
I beg of you,

do not walk by
without pausing
to attend to this
rather ridiculous performance.

It could mean something.
It could mean everything.
It could be what Rilke meant, when he wrote:
You must change your life.

Mary Oliver, Invitation

photo stevevoght

A new week….

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

May you receive great encouragement
when new frontiers beckon.

May you take time to celebrate
the quiet miracles that seek no attention.

May you experience each day
as a sacred gift
woven around the heart of wonder.

John O’Donoghue, Benedictus

photo giorgio minguzzi

Sunday Quote: A Day of Rest

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/ba/Antique_radio_coffee_newspaper.JPG

True restfulness is living ordinary life with a sense of ease, gratitude, appreciation, peace and prayer. We are restful when ordinary life is enough.

Ron Rolheiser, The Shattered Lantern

Home

Karl Duffy1 Comment

File:Thatched cottage Maghera Ardara. - geograph.org.uk - 1073951.jpg

Belonging is related to longing.  If you hyphenate belonging, it yields a lovely axiom for spiritual growth:  Be – Your – Longing.  Longing is a precious instinct in the soul. Where you belong should always be worthy of your dignity. You should belong first in your own interiority.  If you belong there, and if you are in rhythm with yourself and connected to that deep, unique source within, then you will never be vulnerable when your outside belonging is qualified, relativized, or taken away.  You will still be able to stand on your own ground, the ground of your soul, where you are not a tenant, where you are at home.

John O’Donohue,  Anamchara

photo bart whelan

Not avoiding

Karl Duffy2 Comments
 File:14 06 28 Detour Sign Dunedin FL 01.jpg
To see myself and my life as they truly are is joy. 
After all the struggle and avoiding and denying and going the other way,
 it is deeply satisfying for a second to be there with life as it is. 
The satisfaction is the very core of ourselves.
 Who we are is beyond words –
 just that open power of life,  manifesting constantly in all sorts of interesting things,
 even in our own misery and struggles. 
The hassle is both horrendous and wholesome.
Charlotte Joko Beck.