Lighten Up!

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destination, direction, lighten up, Meg Wheatley, perseverance, perspective, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today I have a list of tasks as long as my arm! It’s likely I won’t finish the day having crossed them all off my list but it always helps me to have everything laid out at the beginning so as not to forget something important. I smiled, though, as I read Meg Wheatley’s advice in her little book, Perseverance (p. 20) where she quotes publisher James Gimian who says, “If you can’t get destination, go for direction.”

Wheatley expands on that thought by suggesting a way to proceed. “We could lighten up,” she says. “We could go for direction, not destination. We could invite in what the world seems to want for us, what it is offering us right here, right now. We could enjoy what we’ll see and discover when we take off the blinders of non-negotiable destination.”

That sounds to me like the perfect way to shift our whole perspective on the day, wouldn’t you say?

Stormy Weather

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Annie Dillard, blessed, deeper consciousness, direction, God, Koran, light, storm, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

We are in the midst of tropical storm Philippe this morning – the first weather event this year that has affected us at all. While other locations in our country have been devastated by flood or fire, we in Upstate New York have been blessedly spared from any damaging storms. Even this one just seems to be a steady, soaking rain but we are being warned to prepare for flooding. I believe the warning is just for overflowing streams in locations around the state as it seems that the storm has done its worst elsewhere. I will need to check the basement for water seepage later but mostly today it seems that our task will be to stay inside as much as possible and reflect on the fact that we are still not in charge of everything in life.

In that thought rests possibility if we use the day as an opportunity for deeper consciousness. If we call God to mind each time we consciously hear the drumming of the rain, the day may not be spent in grumbling about the weather effects. Here are two prompts for those moments of consciousness.

1. From Annie Dillard: I cannot cause light. The most I can do is put myself in the path of its beam.
2. From the Qu’ran (Koran): To God belongs the East and the West; and wherever you turn, there is the face of God.

May today be blessed for all of us!

 

 

 

 

 

Signposts

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Alan Cohen, awake, breath, connected, conscious, destination, direction, Gandhi, journey, Meg Wheatley, reminders, slowing down, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, wisdom

Today I am conscious – maybe just because it’s Monday – of the need to be aware of what surrounds me as I live today. There are already so many reminders and it isn’t yet 7:00AM!

• For at least the fifth day in succession there has been dense fog in the morning which could be mistaken for cloudiness portending rain later. Only if I am awake will I not be taken by surprise when the sun comes blazing out from under the mist.
• Alan Cohen’s morning reflection is entitled “Enjoy the Journey” and is peppered with reminders of the wisdom of slowing down so as not to miss what is just ahead of us. For example, he begins with a quote from Gandhi which wisely states that there must be more to life than increasing its speed, and from his own musings on creating a bumper sticker: Going nowhere faster will not get you somewhere.
• From Meg Wheatley: If you can’t get destination, go for direction.
• And most simply, when I wanted to access our website to write this: You’re not connected.

So I take a deep breath and jump into the depths of the day…