… watching for the brushstrokes of God
Rituals arise from the land, surfacing through the bedrock and the soil, and enter the imagination of the people that live there… as a means of attuning ourselves with one another, to the land and the invisible world of spirit. ~ Francis Weller, The Wild Edge of Sorrow
How do you enter healing grounds?
“Winter invites me to rest and contemplation, to making time for quiet walks in the few hours of light. The God of winter invites me into a healing rhythm of rest and renewal, of deep listening in the midst of stillness, of trusting the seeds sprouting deep within that have been planted.” ~ Christine Valters Paintner
What invitation do you sense this winter?
“Far from being a progressive process, grief moves by turns and spirals, a twisting path because it is not always clear or orderly. Grief is the least linear thing I know.” Jan Richardson, Sparrow
What do you carry within you?
There are things
We get through
That we grieve
Only later—
When some new loss
Pulls them to the surface
Of the deep well
In which they’ve
Been submerged.
And so today
Our grief for
The world as we’ve
Known it,
For plans laid down,
For possibilities
Now gone forever,
Is laced with
Golden threads
Of loss we had forgotten,
As if distant waves
Are lapping
On an unseen shore
In the dark of night. Judy Brown
What golden threads of loss are rising to the surface for you?
Let there be
an opening
into the quiet
that lies beneath
the chaos,
where you find the peace
you did not think
possible
and see what shimmers
within the storm.” Jan Richardson, The Cure For Sorrow
What do you discover beneath the chaos?
“…going down into the deep pain of another is like jumping into a bottomless abyss – not knowing if or where one will land. To grasp another’s pain means letting go of our own safety limb and falling down to an unknown place. In this place we maybe won’t have the answers that will help alleviate the pain or explain it. We have to be willing to admit, then and there, down in the pit, that we too are helpless and weak and powerless. And who wants to do that, or be there?” Henri Nouwen
How are you called to presence with?
With the Eyes of the Heart 