Inspirational Blog
Mindful
Every day I see or I hear something that more or less kills me with delight, that leaves me like a needle in the haystack of light. — Mary Oliver from Mindful This poem reminds me of a...
Rock Lessons
a warm fall day, learning from this rock to do nothing —Paul O. Williams I started taking piano lessons when I was in second or third grade. I took first year piano lessons for the next 10 years. There...
Swim with the Tide
Let go of the ways you thought life would unfold; the holding of plans or dreams or expectations—Let it all go. Save your strength to swim with the tide. —Danna Faulds If there was ever a year to let...
Seeing Stars
Summer night: in my eyes starlight hundreds of years old —George Swede Every year I tell myself that I’ll stay up to watch the Perseid meteor showers and it never happens. I like to sleep! But this year, I...
Light the World!
Even after all this time the sun never says to the earth, “You owe me.” Look what happens with a love like that— it lights the whole world. —Hafiz Real gifts are not a tit for tat experience. It’s...
Our Work
Are my boots old? Is my coat torn? Am I no longer young, and still half-perfect? Let me keep my mind on what matters, which is my work. —Mary Oliver What is our work? Our work is not...
Out with the Old
Sweep the mind clean like a field of dry stubble when the constellations of daisies have been mown —Mary Barnard Sometimes my mind is like a cluttered garage with seemingly unrelated thoughts stacked all over the place. Other times,...
Seasonal Moments
beautiful lines of green run through the summer dishes —Tatsuko Hoshino My summer dishes are edged in green with flowers along the border. Using seasonal items, eating seasonal food, wearing seasonal clothes, reminds me that I am...
Worry Like a Pro
Worrying is like a rocking chair. It gives you something to do, but it doesn’t get you anywhere. —Anonymous So many things to worry about and so little time! After many years of diligent worry practice, I realized...
Small But Mighty
If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito. —Dalai Llama When I think of mosquitoes, I think of being annoyed, itchy, losing sleep and possibly made ill. Not the kind...
From Fireworks to the Hard...
Indeed, it is precisely in a period of great spiritual and societal hunger like our own that we most need to open minds, hearts, and memories to those times when women and men actually dreamed of new possibilities for...
A Gift and Another and...
a small dew droplet sits atop a bright green leaf morning air is a gift —T. Iverson We are surrounded by beauty, refreshment and an infinite number of gifts, if we only take the time to notice. Most...
Carrots in My Ears
Be skeptical, but learn to listen. —Don Miguel Ruiz and Don Jose Ruiz from The Fifth Agreement “I can’t hear you. I have carrots in my ears.” I forget what story that’s from but those lines stay with me....
A Moving Target
Always do your best. —Don Miguel Ruiz and Don Jose Ruiz from The Fifth Agreement Just writing that takes me back to the bad, old days of my perfectionism. Perfectionism says “Always do your best to be perfect.”...
Brownie Surprise
Don’t make assumptions. —Don Miguel Ruiz and Don Jose Ruiz from The Fifth Agreement When I was in third grade, I made my mother a box of brownies as a surprise one evening. Boy, was it a surprise!...