My online journal where I share my interests in photography, nature, journaling, fountain pens, bicycling, coffee life, spirituality and the mystery of it all.
I have been glancing at Google news and NPR news for the past month thinking I would stay better informed. I made sure not click on any of the links or read articles, I only read the headlines. But that wisdom showed me that some of my best thinking is not always my best thinking. In no time at all I found myself both angry and weeping for the world. So today as I journaled on my porch I wondered when was the last time we saw headlines with news of hope, love, compassion, tolerance, peace, forgiveness, acceptance, and stories of people who are making a positive difference in the world? Maybe that voice must come from each of us. I hope you have a wonderful weekend!
Waiting area outside the Lory Student Center Theater
“Really all we have to offer the world is the gift of our individuality. We can never be just like any other person. Our journey through life is an extremely personal contribution to the work of being human.”
Jane Reichhold
In my experience when anyone tries to force their opinions and their rules as the norm for everyone, they are no longer being a gift. We see this evidenced in our attempts to use war as a way to create unity rather than embracing individuality. There is enough historical evidence to prove war is not a gift and has never brought unity! So maybe our task in life is to encourage and nurture those around us who need to offer their personal contribution of being human. Who knows, maybe their contribution will enrich everyone’s lives. I find it sad that so many world leaders arrogantly deny others the opportunity to be the individual gift they are, this work of being human. And, it is a gift!
I spent an hour at the Harmony Library this afternoon. It has been a cold day so the library sounded inviting. I was a librarian my senior year in high school to pickup a credit or two. As I reflected I realized that working in the library today is much different than in 1968. Back then nothing was digital. The old card file system worked just fine and an ink can with an ink soaked sponge and a rubber stamp. Interestingly I watched as librarians helped people with the many desktop computers that they have everywhere. So a librarian needs to be tech savvy now a days. They also have a media center where people can print papers, articles and assignments. My media center back then was a notebook and pencil. As I sat and journaled with my fountain pen, I noticed a crackling and rustling sound as a woman sitting near me turned the pages of a newspaper. Now that’s a sound I don’t hear much any more. I also watched several people carrying stacks of 3-6 books to check out, which means there are still people who read books rather than watch television.
Please remember that certainty—not doubt—is the opposite of faith. The insistence on certainty reveals a need for control, not a need for love or understanding.
Richard Rohr
Holding a perspective of certainty allows some people to justify putting others down because of the attempt to try and strip them of their humanity or believing them to be less than us. But this belief is the ego putting itself on a pedestal and rejecting self-restraint, understanding, compassion, and any willingness to dialogue. This is hate and intolerance. I find it difficult to be around such people because there is almost no openness to sharing ideas with narcissistic people. What can be even more frightening is when we are basing certainty on half truths or even lies. I have come to embrace living in the adventure and mystery of life.
Needing some time out on the prairie to journal I headed east. Stopped at a favorite spot and I was surrounded by hundreds of Canada Geese. Needless to say I did not find much peace and quiet for journaling but I did enjoy my time. Hundreds of them. Waves of them. Makes you wonder where they came from and where they are headed. More mystery.
We are here to grow in wisdom and to learn to love better.
Rachel Naomi Remen
It was 11 degrees this morning so no sunrise photo although there was a lovely pink sunrise in the eastern sky. I enjoyed my mocha and conversation with Jeff and John this morning at Mugs. Alissia was our barista. Not a bad way to start a cold Sunday morning. I would like to say and live Remen’s quote as a prayer throughout this day for the world. And a keyword in her quote that stands out for me is “we.” Seems we need a good dose of wisdom, love, and prayer right now. I hope you have a good Sunday. Stay warm and dry for those of you on the eastern coast.
Accept what comes from silence. Make the best you can of it. Of little words that come out of silence, like prayers prayed back to the one who prays, make a poem that does not disturb the silence from which it came.
“There is a great difference between defending life and befriending it. Defending life is often about holding on to whatever you have at all cost. Befriending life may be about strengthening and supporting life’s movement toward its own wholeness. It may require us to take great risks to let go, over and over again, until we finally surrender to life’s own dream of itself.”
This afternoon I needed time away from the city, again, so I drove out to the eastern plains for a bit of physical silence and solitude. I spent several hours out there, actually. My last stop was this old cottonwood. I look up to this Old Soul who has stood guard over this field and the horizon for many years now. If you’ve followed me for any length of time you have seen several images of this Elder, as I check on them often. What made me stop and take this image was some journaling I did an hour earlier. I am aware of the challenge it is to capture images without the sign of man involved. The Old Soul or Romantic in me has often wondered how I would experience this land with its silence, its solitude and the vastness of it 200-300 years ago. So today I listed a few things in my journal that would not have been here then. There would be no roads, no vehicles, no air pollution, no oil well pumps, no fences, no bar ditches where someone has dumped an old couch, no jets overhead and their contrails, no plowed fields, no irrigation systems, no power lines, no cell towers, no wind turbines, no fields of solar panels, no housing developments, no warehouses full of stuff, no dairy farms, no buried gas lines, no water towers, no farms, and the list could go on. And, one more thing that would be missing would be the sound pollution coming from man’s machinery. I guess what I really was aware of today was how invasive man has been in nature, wondering how many people seem unaware, and may even believe it has always been this way. The sun has set and darkness moves in. It is time for me to publish this, fill my bowl with popcorn and read for awhile. May you stay safe and warm and enjoy your weekend.
