A Mindful Life

As a way of ushering in the New Year, here are two quotes for good measure. Celebratin’ New Year’s Eve is like eatin’ oranges. You got to let go your dignity t’ really enjoy ‘em. –Edna Ferber, Buttered Side Down (1912) The etiquette question that troubles so many fastidious people New Year’s Day is: How [...]

I’ll be taking a vacation from posting here for about the next two weeks. Company arrives on Tuesday for a five day visit, and then I travel to my hometown to celebrate Christmas with my folks, to return near the end of the year. Since I write about self-care in this blog, I’ve decided to [...]

Mysticism and creativity have this in common: they require a person to live truthfully at every level of being. –Marilyn Whiteside, in Journal of Creative Behavior (1981)

Aaron is on the bima, speeding through the final brachot after completing his Haftorah portion when a warm flush starts at his toes and spreads, opening like a feather fan, to the top of his head. Suddenly, every particle of him is shimmering. He can sense each part of his body, down to each hair [...]

I should think you could be gladder on Monday mornin’ than any other day in the week, because ‘twould be a whole week before you’d have another one! –Eleanor H. Porter, Pollyanna (1912)

For a dervish every day feels like Friday, the beginning of a holiday, a fresh setting out that will not have an end. Dressed in the soul’s handsomeness, you’re a whole month of Fridays, sweet outside, sweet in. Your mind and your deep being walk together as friends walk along inside their friendship. Debris does [...]

The problem is we think we exist. We think our words are permanent and solid and stamp us forever. That’s not true. We write in the moment. Sometimes when I read poems at a reading to strangers, I realize they think those poems are me. They are not me, even if I speak in the [...]

Looking upon myself from the perspective of society, I am an average person. Facing myself intimately, immediately, I regard myself as unique, as exceedingly precious, not to be exchanged for anything else. No one will live my life for me, no one will think my thoughts for me or dream my dreams. In the eyes [...]

He prayed as he breathed, forming no words and making no specific requests, only holding in his heart, like broken birds in cupped hands, all those people who were in stress or grief. –Ellis Peters, A Morbid Taste for Bones (1977)

Someone recently asked me if I knew what a Taizé service is. I didn’t, so I thought I’d see what I could find. At FaithLinks, there is a brief description of it. The roots of this tradition are in France, where it was established during the second World War. It’s an ecumenical Christian prayer tradition [...]