Tag: Ireland

The wonder of this day

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

square-treees

All that is eternal in me
Welcomes the wonder of this day,
The field of brightness it creates
Offering time for each thing
To arise and illuminate.

May my mind come alive today
To the invisible geography
That invites me to new frontiers,
To break the dead shells of yesterdays,
To risk being disturbed and changed.

May I have the courage today
To live the life I would love,
To postpone my dream no longer
But do at last what I came here for
And waste my heart on fear no more.

John O’Donohue, Morning Prayer

Halloween bonfires

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

File:Solstice fire Montana.jpg

This evening marks the important Celtic feast of Samhain which starts winter and we enter the “darker half” of the year, a theme which is somewhat reflected in the celebration of Halloween. However, the ancient idea was far deeper, as we are invited to go inside and imitate the landscape in slowing down. Some element of darkness is present in all our lives. Modern society has enough elements to keep up distracted, but inevitably, from time to time, we are confronted with life’s fragility and we are invited to welcome its lessons. Moments such as these help burn away what is not essential and bring us back to our foundations. We see what really matters  and realize that searching outside of ourselves is not the way:

How many nights must it take
one such as me to learn
that we aren’t, after all, made
from that bird that flies out of its ashes,  
that for us  
as we go up in flames,

our one work is
to open ourselves, to be  
the flames?

Galway Kinnell

Sunday Quote: Grounded inside yourself

Karl Duffy3 Comments

IMG_1543

In the past days,  how many times have we run this way and that, expending energy in places that don’t really align with the deepest sense of where we are going?

Lighthouses don’t go running all over an island looking for boats to save;

they just stand there shining

Anne Lamott

Sunday Quote: Spacious

Karl Duffy1 Comment

sunrise

The world is vast

and the body and breath are spacious

when we are at ease with ourselves and others

Michael Stone, from his lovely book, Awake in the World

photo of early morning sun in Glendalough, on a beautiful Saturday in October which reminded me of Rilke :

I would like to step out of my heart

and go walking beneath the enormous sky.

True self, false self

Karl Duffy1 Comment

lake-glendalough

We spend a lot of time creating suffering through imagining scenarios that never actually come to pass. These can be with us even as we get up in the morning. One way the different traditions try to help with this is by encouraging us to drop into the natural calm that lies beneath the restless thoughts – our natural wakefulness, our “true face”. Being mindful is something intrinsic to the mind, not something foreign we are trying to bring in. It is like sinking below the ripples on the surface of the lake and finding calm depths beneath.

In this high place, it is as simple as this,
leave everything you know behind.

Step toward the cold surface, say the old prayer of rough love
and open both arms.

Those who come with empty hands
will stare into the lake astonished
there in the cold light, reflecting cold snow

the true shape of your own face

David Whyte, Tilokal Lake

Hearing the song

Karl Duffy2 Comments

river-glendalough

I spent the weekend in Glendalough and was able to walk in nature early in the morning among the trees and rivers. Some say even the rocks there vibrate with life. It was easy to feel grace and see wonder, just as we did as children.  So what we strive for in our working days – in the “chambers of commerce” –  is to remember that beauty and grace are never far from us. They are in the leaf, the stone, the heart.  If we listen,  there is wonder all around, and it sings. Can we hear it today?

What can I say that I have not said before? So I’ll say it again.
The leaf has a song in it.
Stone is the face of patience.
Inside the river there is an unfinishable story
and you are somewhere in it
and it will never end until all ends.

Take your busy heart to the art museum and the chamber of commerce
but take it also to the forest.
The song you heard singing in the leaf when you
were a child is singing still.
I am of years lived, so far, seventy-four,
and the leaf is singing still

Mary Oliver,  What can I say?