Category: General Learning

From the collection, Ask Me, Stafford writes of the stories that we hold together with a few dear ones, and of how we move ourselves to the next stories. It’s a theme I find calling to me. I often ask Dana, “What is the simple story here?” It’s our version of seeing the “stars move.”

For inspiration.

Our Story
William Stafford

Remind me again — together we
trace our strange journey, find
each other, come on laughing.
Some time we’ll cross where life
ends. We’ll both look back
as far as forever, that first day.
I’ll touch you — a new world then.
Stars will move a different way.
We’ll both end. We’ll both begin.

Remind me again.

A nod to James Crews, whose musings in The Weekly Pause are stirring and affirming some of the practices and ways of being that I’m most drawn to.

Deep Listening
James Crews

Listening is just a way of going still,
so I can hear the slightest sounds
all around me. The house breathing
on its own, the machine we call
the air exchange doing its unsung work
of bringing fresh air into each room,
then gently shutting off. My husband’s
footfalls crossing the floor above,
low voices of a documentary left
playing on TV. Isn’t this listening too,
waiting for our lives to speak to us? 
Rustle of my flannel shirt as I pull it on,
button it up, listening so far back
I remember a time when I couldn’t
do this myself and had to ask my mother
for help. How she knelt on the floor
in front of me until we were face to face,
and she tugged each tiny button
through its proper hole, her hands
making quick work of keeping me warm,
making my world whole again.

Waiting for our lives to speak to us. Yes, listening.

His words point me back to journal reflections this morning, part of my ongoing commitment to integration and presence. “Accepting what is” as I’ve felt the last 10 days pass as if a blink. “Accepting what is” as I’ve mapped out my day today, my doings, with some kindness and commitment.

• Personal Integrating + Presence (journal, exercise bike, meditation, this blog);
• Learning + Growing (two calls with colleagues);
• Nourishment + Tending (breakfast, light task stuff);
• Cultivation + Syncing (another call with someone interested in my programs);
• Integration + Presencing, Continued (maybe a short walk, some other email tending);
• Projects + Planning (today, a poetry publication)
• Physical Vessel Attention (yes, this is exercise and stretching — at this age of life, I find it has to be deliberate)
• Nourishment + Tending, Continued (dinner, some other light tucking / tending):
• Conversations + Life (an open space for choices, play, walk with my Sweetie, watching a documentary / historical fiction on John Adams

Listening in all of it. As always, it’s quite a thing to give ourselves to all of that inner and all of that outer. That point to accepting. That point to celebrating.

You know, I love living amidst a network of Circle Practitioners. Some are friends. Some are colleagues. Some or fellow seekers. Some are curious onlookers. Some are all.

My friend Jenny (thx Jenny) recently sent this little Circle prompt. Comes from Carrie Newcomer.

I’m gonna try it — maybe in a scheme with Jenny.

🙂

Community Creative Project

Prompt: 

Write a Series of Five or Six Postcards (short, a couple of sentences) To Someone Who Has Made A Positive Impact On Your Life. This can be to a person you know, an ancestor to whom you feel connected, an author, a poet, a 1st grade teacher, a dog, a person you only met once….but it should be a person that made some large or small positive impact. 

Sharing: 

Share 1 or 2 of these Postcards with the group. I think this will be very creative and fun to see who we each choose to write our postcards, and what we say.

The best relationships I have mix the playful with the serious. The silly with the sincere. The reaching with the obvious.

The best relationships I have include workships, friendships, olders, youngers. And all of the betweens.

Recently I sent playful note to friend Elif, referencing Becoming & Belonging (B & B) with Spirit & Skill (S & S). And then, she added Wonder & Wander (W & W).

Yup, playful.

B & B
S & S
W & W

Come jump in. It’s playful and serious.
For Wanderful (a longer online excursion next Thursday).
Or for other B & B (S & S, W & W) offerings.