Image of the Week

"Sheltering Beneath Katsura"

Monday Meditations

mindful practices to nourish you throughout the day and week

Choose one of the following prompts and make a gratitude list focused on that word: compassion, faith, Earth.  

Pause

I treasure you, Blog Reader. Your attention to these posts warms my heart. Thank you! I always have Earthy-creative things to share with you that I hope will inspire your own journey deeper into compassionate relationship with all beings, including the more-than-humans and your own inner wild places.

 

For now, I need to take a pause on these word-filled Friday posts. I have other creative and writing projects that must be finished, not least of all my book manuscript that needs my full focus as I make substantive edits. 

 

In my community efforts with interfaith climate justice work, I have been calling for pauses at events. People are beginning to expect that I will be the person at event planning meetings who calls for us to build moments of reflective silence into these group gatherings. Now it is time to offer my creative work that same moment of contemplative, quiet endeavor. 

 

On the forthcoming post-less Fridays, feel free to:

·      visit the fourteen years of blog posts archived on this site 

(scroll down the left sidebar to select by date, or do a search on the upper left);

·      check out the many short and long videos on my YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmH2LvfKbyw317YkMuiLp8w);

·      go to the website media page for articles, videos, photos, interviews (http://www.tealarborstories.com/pg11.cfm).

 

But please rest assured that Monday Meditations and Wednesday Image of the Week blog posts will continue (except during the winter holy days when TEALarbor stories’ office will be closed Dec. 11th – Jan. 3rd). 

 

I look forward to seeing you on Fridays again on the other side of this productive expanse. It is my fervent invocation that you will recognize your own needs for pause, reflection, and soul nourishment as we move toward winter in the northern hemisphere. 

 

Image of the Week

"Color Play"

Monday Meditations

mindful practices to nourish you throughout the day and week

Say “thank you” to a tree or plant who is now shedding its foliage.  

fallen

lately, i have fallen again

– it’s cliché i know –

in love, in rapture, in giddy crush, with the:

 

dark glow of Ebony

on the Saltwater’s surface at Sunset yesterday

 

Maple whose leaves blazed 

her fiery hues into the cracks of my heart 

 

Heron who flew low across the Tideline

searching for lunch as i searched for soulfood

 

many faces of Saltwater – blue, silver, ochre, white, peach

an evershifting spectrum of shimmer

 

Clouds who are shaped by Autumn

into layers and hues that blanket my being

 

Kingfisher who rattles and dives

headfirst into the treasure-waters of seafood

 

Hunter’s Moon whose bright orange upper limb

surprisingly peeked through thick Nimbostratus

 

Banana Slug who feasted on apricots

Whole and undigested in a pile of Bear scat

 

Katsura leaves whose cooked-sugar scent

beckons from a distance 

 

spring green Inchworm undulating up a tree trunk

amid Fall’s golds and reds

 

Darkness stretching beyond Dawn and before Dusk

the potent call to explore the crevices where Spirit and matter conjoin

an unlikely reunion of Ethereal with material, heart with body, candlelight with poetry, painting with journaling, Quietude with spoken Blessing

 

Grace

Divine Love

Tender Bliss

 

in love, in rapture, in giddy crush

Image of the Week

"Sunset En Route"

 

Monday Meditations

mindful practices to nourish you throughout the day and week

Sit for ten minutes under a tree who’s familiar to you and notice details in the bark and foliage. 

Storm

Calm before the storm outside. Everything in the natural world is still, presently. All the humans are in fast-paced hordes, nearly rear-ending each other in their haste to load up cars with provisions and return home to hunker in.

 

And despite all this, I am thinking, Here’s what is really necessary:

 

Loving people.

Protecting the vulnerable.

Appreciating the power of nature. (We were in a hugely damaging earthquake just two years ago; I recall how much I had to “muster” my appreciation that day.)

Savoring. Relaxing into what is. Gently declining the offer to drink more than one cup of tea with Worry.

 

Today, I count my blessings again, proactively, with a kind of faith: 

 

There are lessons as well as beauty in a storm; may all beings find unconditional peace.

 

 

(Excerpt from a blog post in Oct. 2016.)

  

Image of the Week

"Bliss"

 

Monday Meditations

mindful practices to nourish you throughout the day and week

Gather a few fallen twigs, leaves, or cones and tie them in a bundle. Offer this gift to someone who can’t easily get outside.

 

Of This Earth

Because I am of this Earth,

I am rooted in direct

Tangible expression of it – 

 

Hands touching the soil, 

Fingers using implements to somehow translate 

Experience of the natural into the symbolism of words

The flow of paint

The etching of pencil

The scattered shards of torn paper. 

 

Moving in outer landscapes is the way 

To remain in contact 

With who we really are on the inner one. 

 

We take our pain and sorrows, 

excitement and successes, 

frailty 

courage 

history 

future 

into the present moment of shared passions: 

 

creativity and earthiness. 

 

For me, these are inseparable…I cannot have one without the other.  

 

(Excerpt from post in Oct. 2012)