This is the place where clouds are born and I am floating…a storm is coming in.  Linda Hogan

There is no storm coming in this morning, except maybe in my head where someone (who IS that?) is arguing loudly that getting up at this time of morning and walking is …. boring, hard, not fair.  All of which is countered by my body singing, keeping rhythm to my walking feet, delirious to be outside and moving.  *I* am bemused watching all of this, slightly removed.  I have no idea how all of these pieces have managed to stay together for 70 plus years.  You’d think by now it would have all blown apart.  But here we are, grumpy and happy and me, walking paths we learned this summer so well that no decisions need to be about direction or timing.  There is no hurry.  That’s the best part.

After about half an hour, the head noise quiets down, notices the body’s humming, feels the sun’s warmth countered by the chill air, and curiosity arises.  Finally I can see outside of me instead of just the moving pictures being run by my head.

At that point all of us focus on gathering something beautiful to start our day.  I thought you might enjoy it too.

True contentment is pretty rare…When joy does come, it should be celebrated…It is healing, restorative, encouraging of the way we’re meant to be…It’s only in my later life that I’m becoming more and more happy day in and day out…Joy is less and less a momentary rush, and more of an undercurrent, the accompanying music singing through my days. Gabrielle Roth

Soul is closer to movement than it is to fixity, said Socrates, and loss of soul is the condition of being stuck – fixated on something…The arts…are ideal for leading us toward movement…take your camera nad pick a theme…and head out for an afternoon to capture it.  What we’re after is letting the unconscious go on a roll...  Gregg Levoy

Transformative practices have many purposes…[have an] ability to bring you into direct contact with the numinouse, to wake you up to the sanctity of life…can offer much more than you may have initially bargained for…it takes bravery, courage, and commitment to show up every day and be who you really are.  “Living Deeply” Schlitz, Vieten, Amorok

We speak of stealing time as if it no longer belonged to us.  We speak of needing time as if it wasn’t around us already in every moment.  We want to make time for ourselves as if it were in our power to do so.  Time is the converation with absence and visitation…the hours become ripe with happening only when we are attentive, patient, and present…

With a healthy outlaw approach, we are outside the laws of predictable cause and effect and inside the intensity of creative origianlity.  We have a gleam in our eye; we look to the edges of things; no one really knows what we are up to.  We see with the eyes of those who do not quite belong.  We are dangerous again, and glad to be so.  David Whyte

[when we are] more aware of what agreements, or beliefs, we are holding that don’t serve us, we can choose again, can make conscious agreements that support and nourish who we really are. HeatherAsh Amara

Does one really have to fret About enlightenment? No matter what road I travel, I’m going home. Shinsho