… watching for the brushstrokes of God
“Certain attitudes support [hope]. One is patience, an ability to tolerate delays, a willingness to let events unfold in their own time. The other is courage, an attitude of confidence even when facing the unknown. A third is persistence, the determination to keep going no matter what happens.” ~ Maurice J. Nutt
What supports your hope?
What an amazing thing it would be to have the rhythms of your life regularly usher you into such deep trust that you could actually rest from it all. Who would we be, who would I be, if I trusted like this for twenty-four hours once a week? ~ Ruth Haley Barton
Do you trust enough to rest?
In the Ojibwe tradition, dream catchers served to catch any negative energies, everything that was potentially harmful was snared in the web, protecting the energies of those sleeping there.
How do you weave a web of protection?
As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’s
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same: … ~ Gerard Manley Hopkins
What did you come for?
As deep as I ever went into the forest
I came upon an old stone bench, very, very old,
and around it a clearing, and beyond that
trees taller and older than I had ever seen.
Such silence!
…Sometimes there’s only a hint, a possibility.
What’s magical, sometimes, has deeper roots
than reason…
I sat on the bench, waiting for something.
An angel, perhaps. Or dancers with the legs of goats.
No, I didn’t see either. But only, I think, because
I didn’t stay long enough. ~ Mary Oliver
Are you staying long enough?
It may be that when we no longer know what to do
we have come to our real work,
and that when we no longer know which way to go
we have come to our real journey.
The mind that is not baffled is not employed.
The impeded stream is the one that sings. ~ Wendell Berry
What does this require of you?
With the Eyes of the Heart 