
The Need to Continue
Older now, you find holiness
in anything that continues
-Naomi Shihab Nye
The longer I wake on this Earth, the louder the quiet things speak to me. The more I experience and thrive, the more I find truth in the commonalities we all share. The more pain softens me, the deeper my joy and the greater the lessons of those things that live in great stillness.
Before I had cancer, I used to complain quiet a lot, annoyed that every chore would need to be done again, that the grass would grow back as soon as it was cut. Now I am in awe of how it will grow no matter what you do to it. How I need that knowledge.
Now, thirteen years from that bed, I am standing in a gentle rain, each drop a whisper of simple things I will never understand. Now, there is only air in the sky of heart waiting to rain. Now, I am thinner, grayer, brighter, less able to say, and my heart has learned more on this side than it will ever let me know. Now, I want to learn how to kiss an orange, unpeeled, and taste the juice.
Thirteen years ago the unasked-for growth disppeared, and – with deep gratitude – I have been shedding ever since. Now, all that remains is my unveiled heart wanting to live.
This week’s Soul Challenge:
*sit quietly and consider your thoughts as leaves and your heart as the tree
*breathe slowly, and try to listen to the soil you share with everything
*breathe depely, and meditate on what is oldest in you
~AmiLynne
Chief Travel Partner
Thank you for sharing this journey with me.
I love you deeply, for in truth we are old friends.
We are One.