For
me, this is how it works. I experience something beautiful and my soul is
comforted. I feel a deep connection with someone or something and I am
soothed.
This
week I have sought the nourishing waters of refreshment for my spirit through:
Low
tide walks on the pebbled beach
Pointing
out to a boisterous two-year-old the rising, huge, orange, wet-paint, full moon
and watching him pause and then loudly proclaim, “Moon!”
Collecting
stones that are encircled with layers of other types of rock: each brings
together two disparate halves into a whole
Being
followed by the rainbow that straddled Puget Sound a few days ago
Watching
the clouds dance with the now-waning moon, obscuring and revealing the
brightly-lit ball like a game of cosmic hide and seek
Hearing,
noticing, photographing, standing in awe of two mating bald eagles high in the
Douglas firs during my repeated visits to the water’s edge
Laughing
until my stomach hurt
It
is in these events, the everyday happenings in the course of life, that we are
healed. It is how we are made whole again after the inevitable wrenchings,
tearings, riftings, shiftings that are the changeability of our lives. These
simple things add up to a short list. The effort of compiling the list is an
act of gratitude, of peacemaking, of surrender to this Life that is.
It
is also a way to honor the sacred that is part of our everyday.
The
“big stuff” just happens; we can count on that…it comes in shapes and sizes
that fit, and others that are grossly oversized or minute and cramped. But the
healing (“whole-making”) comes as we allow the little things to impact us over
and over again.
I
would rather not wait for that one huge moment that I can unmistakably identify
as a “Miracle.” Instead, I would rather count the small things—those things we
call “ordinary”—as the healers and miracles of my life. I may or may not see
the “burning bush.” But surely the cycles of day and night, seasons, disease
and death and laughter, beautiful stones and simple conversations, movement and
breath will continue to flow in and out of my life each day; it is these I
embrace!
[Excerpt from a post five
years ago today; just as relevant now as then.]
 |
| Spot the two bald eagles. |
All blog images created & photographed by Jennifer J. Wilhoit unless otherwise noted. Please circulate images with photo credit: "©2017 JenniferJWilhoit/TEALarbor stories. AllRightsReserved."
