Category: General Learning

Coleman Barks died recently. He’s a well-known interpreter of Rumi’s work. Which means he’s been rather helpful to invite Sufi poetry and mysticism from the 1200s to contemporary inspirations of now.

Praise to the translators. I’m glad to know such poetry, to be moved by it.

From Rumi…

Sometimes you hear a voice through the door calling you.
This turning toward what you deeply love, saves you.
(Thx Katharine for sharing this recently.)

Praise to the translators. Because I feel like this is a good description for much the work that many of us do. We point to doors and voices. We point to love.

Praise to translating language — from the commonality of mechanization and fragmentation to an invited new commonality of living systems dynamics and connection.

Praise to translating habits of speed and efficiency that are helpful with simple, linear problems to habits of slowing down and reflection that are helpful with complex and socially demanding problems.

Praise to the translators for honoring kindness and passion.

Praise.

That’s Perseverance, which my friend Meg wrote in 2010. It’s really a good goto book, mostly short one-page essays that touch the theme of perseverance. I’m glad for this collection. Meg’s been touching my heart for a long, long time.

In Perseverance, Meg asks,

How is it that some people persevere,
remaining steadfast and persistent no matter what?

How is it that some people, even with failures, betrayals, and set-backs,
still keep going, working for what they care about?

How do they not fall victim to exhaustion and despair?

How do they preserve their energy, their motivation, their faith?

I’m glad to have such questions guiding me. Reminding me — cause, most of us face those days when we say, or want to say, fuck it.

But also because, as my friends Jerry and Kathy reminded me yesterday in our Shades of Life Conversation, most people are inherently good, and care about neighbors, dogs, cats, gardens, helping out.

People persevere, I persevere, when we / I remember the bigger story, the centering purpose. People persevere when they / I have friends and colleagues that learn together, that laugh and cry together. People persevere when they / I have others that understand, “not today, I just don’t have it” or “it’s OK, I got you.”

Thx Meg. Thx to all my persevering peeps close in and a bit more distant getting to the enduring, persevering heart of it.

I guess I’m on this theme, following yesterday’s share.

Today it’s Mitch Albom’s Tuesday’s with Morrie.

“The way you get meaning into your life is to devote yourself to loving others, devote yourself to your community around you, and devote yourself to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning.”

For some this might be a great change. However, more most of us, this encouragement just brings importance nuance. Do what you do; do it with love of others.

I’m glad for the reminder.

Hey.

My buddy Chris shared this recently. It’s a Louise Erdrich passage, from The Painted Drum, her 2005 novel.

Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won’t either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself that you tasted as many as you could.

Yes, please.

To the words. To the sentiment. To the invitation. To the reminder. To the art, discipline, and joy of connecting principle to practice, centering to doing.

Hey.