Hoping for the hope to dream
Like an iridescent humming bird
Tapping painted flowers on paper lanterns
with searching beak
You are a shockingly beautiful miracle
Hungering for what can fuel your quest.
Hoping for the hope to dream
Seems all there is to do
Loving in the meantime
Seems all there is for you....
You're hoping for the hope to dream.
You're a monarch winged in gold like fire.
Your trembling strength is stronger than the wind
On which you fly
To a place you'll know just when you find it
Knowing where you're going but not quite why.
Hoping for the hope to dream
Is all there is to do
I'll love you in the meantime
I'll hold that hope for you
You've held my heart in yours so many times.
There's beauty so intense it rips my heart
The way you take my hand and try to smile
There's love so fierce
I want to give you impossible things and
Everything else too so you won't cry.
Keep hoping for the hope to dream
Its all there is to do
I'll love you while you're waiting
It's the best thing I can do
I hope you'll find the hope to dream.
-Natalie
September 2010
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Friday, September 11, 2009
When a Great Teacher arrives...
A Great Teacher has entered my life. This teacher must have drawn near some months ago but waited just outside the reach of my awareness for a while, allowing me time to ready myself.
In the presence of my new teacher, each moment, every day seems infused with a kind of light that makes more brilliant what's true, and the unessential disappear. I do not even have to think what to focus upon and where to let go, such a clarifying force is the presence of this teacher.
I feel stronger than I have ever felt. Stronger than I could even have hoped or imagined. Yet it is a very gentle strength, one that is more wind than steel. My body moves with me as it always has, yet it feels like a fragile friend to cherish. It asks for gentle movement and then rest. I am compelled to grant this humble request from this lifelong friend. You see, it is overwhelmed at a cellular level by the advent of the teacher.
My new teacher is known as cancer (lymphoma, to be more precise).
I know that sharing this with people will inevitably lead to questions like "why". I am aware of past stresses upon my body and psyche that could have contributed to this. I know enough about genetics, epigenetics, pesticides, microwaves, radiation, energy, viruses, etc. etc. etc. to know that there are a myriad of very subtle factors that can combine to originate something that progresses into a physical issue. The root cause be what it may, I have a very strong sense that the illness is teaching me everything I need to know and that I am in a healing process, as contradictory as that may seem. I know that the people who know me are shaken by this news. I understand and I have been there. Some may feel disillusioned, having believed consciously or not that a regular yoga practice like mine should have granted me some kind of immunity. It's understandable. However, I have always enthusiastically conveyed that while yoga may not make you immune to life's stresses, it is a wonderful tool that helps a person to live deeper, stronger, more resiliently, more joyfully. I can also now say with even more resonance: it works!!!
I feel absolutely cradled by spirit and the good intent and prayers of friends and family, too. While I am focusing on my connection with friends and spirit, all of the material manifestations of how supported I am in this challenging time amaze me (such as the excellent care I am receiving on the physical level). I will make good of this experience and will be grateful for how it contributes to my evolution. I am deepening, mellowing, learning so much... I AM HEALING! Even if I get sicker, even if I have to go through chemotherapy, whatever the road entails, it is for me a process of healing on every level.
I am not only "going to be" okay, but I am okay. I am not worried, because I know that I have always been blessed by the Great Teachers that have come into my life. While the nature of this situation is daunting, it is helping me to learn in a very deep way things I've needed to learn for a long time: not to strive, to surrender and trust, to be kind to myself, to let in the love and caring of others, to let my light really shine.. If I can share the joy of all that is good in this, it resonates even more strongly within me (0: Thank you for being here with me.
In the presence of my new teacher, each moment, every day seems infused with a kind of light that makes more brilliant what's true, and the unessential disappear. I do not even have to think what to focus upon and where to let go, such a clarifying force is the presence of this teacher.
I feel stronger than I have ever felt. Stronger than I could even have hoped or imagined. Yet it is a very gentle strength, one that is more wind than steel. My body moves with me as it always has, yet it feels like a fragile friend to cherish. It asks for gentle movement and then rest. I am compelled to grant this humble request from this lifelong friend. You see, it is overwhelmed at a cellular level by the advent of the teacher.
My new teacher is known as cancer (lymphoma, to be more precise).
I know that sharing this with people will inevitably lead to questions like "why". I am aware of past stresses upon my body and psyche that could have contributed to this. I know enough about genetics, epigenetics, pesticides, microwaves, radiation, energy, viruses, etc. etc. etc. to know that there are a myriad of very subtle factors that can combine to originate something that progresses into a physical issue. The root cause be what it may, I have a very strong sense that the illness is teaching me everything I need to know and that I am in a healing process, as contradictory as that may seem. I know that the people who know me are shaken by this news. I understand and I have been there. Some may feel disillusioned, having believed consciously or not that a regular yoga practice like mine should have granted me some kind of immunity. It's understandable. However, I have always enthusiastically conveyed that while yoga may not make you immune to life's stresses, it is a wonderful tool that helps a person to live deeper, stronger, more resiliently, more joyfully. I can also now say with even more resonance: it works!!!
I feel absolutely cradled by spirit and the good intent and prayers of friends and family, too. While I am focusing on my connection with friends and spirit, all of the material manifestations of how supported I am in this challenging time amaze me (such as the excellent care I am receiving on the physical level). I will make good of this experience and will be grateful for how it contributes to my evolution. I am deepening, mellowing, learning so much... I AM HEALING! Even if I get sicker, even if I have to go through chemotherapy, whatever the road entails, it is for me a process of healing on every level.
I am not only "going to be" okay, but I am okay. I am not worried, because I know that I have always been blessed by the Great Teachers that have come into my life. While the nature of this situation is daunting, it is helping me to learn in a very deep way things I've needed to learn for a long time: not to strive, to surrender and trust, to be kind to myself, to let in the love and caring of others, to let my light really shine.. If I can share the joy of all that is good in this, it resonates even more strongly within me (0: Thank you for being here with me.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Rumi -The Guest House
The Guest House
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice.
meet them at the door laughing and invite them in.
Be grateful for whatever comes.
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
-- Jelaluddin Rumi,
translation by Coleman Barks
Friday, September 26, 2008
Autumn
Autumn stirs, from somewhere very deep within, certain yearnings... I crave a long walk in the woods and to hear the swish of leaves around my feet. I want to drape myself in colors bright and warm as a symphony of maple foliage. To breathe in deeply and let the crisp air fill me with nostalgia. Also, I would like to slow everything down a bit. The days melt into night much faster now, and life is poised to change. I would love to just sit under the trees one day and learn from them how to change with life's cycles so gracefully. So gorgeously.
May I learn to let change flow through me and to shed to the wind what once was vibrantly important, trusting in the light that in good time will awaken another aspect of me to emerge and unfold into life.
May I learn to let change flow through me and to shed to the wind what once was vibrantly important, trusting in the light that in good time will awaken another aspect of me to emerge and unfold into life.
Monday, September 22, 2008
Defiantly Joyful
My first post! This site is an homage to the sunflower that bloomed in the crack between the highway and the median this summer. It is about the courage that it takes to open oneself to life fully, every day, and to be enriched by the pain as by the beauty. It's about the role models, music, philosophies, friends and experiences that make life rich. It's about joy cultivated from wisdom. It's not about being "happy" all the time or even most of the time. It's about promising yourself that, no matter how hard life might get, you'll never become embittered and jaded, that you will always seek to feel the joy again.
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