Our teacher, Guy Finley, challenged us last night to do a simple exercise each morning. Find a quote, something that touches us, and spend time exploring it. He said, "Something greater always sits behind - sits within - all wisdom...in all that is beautiful. So, there is no end to what you can discover. Go explore."
And so I'm moved to return here to do just that. Here is the Pearl I'll ponder this morning.
"May I never miss a sunset or a rainbow because I am looking down." (Sara June Parker)
We have had another beautiful fall here in southern Oregon. Deborah and I have walked through cathedrals of trees, divinely aglow in their red and yellow vestments. We've sat captivated, watching troupes of leaves dancing and spinning joyfully as the breezes sent them flying.
And I've watched sunrises out my office window as I've sipped my coffee...and sunsets as we've sat on our front deck enjoying the end of the day that rival the masterpieces of Monet and Rembrandt. Truly stunning compositions of light and shade and wonder. Witnesses to God's easel and to his brushstrokes.
Ms. Parker's quote reminds me of the one absolute prerequisite for me to enjoy any of these wonders. It is to stop and to look up. To get out of my head and the world of thought. To lift myself out of the well-worn ruts of "habit", "what I gotta do", and "comfort", and work a little bit to feel something...and to be open.
To feel and to be open sound like such inviting things, yet there's something inside of me that shies away from doing so. Something that prefers the smaller world of "the known" where it sits on its throne regally declaring, "Been there. Seen that. Love that. Don't like that." And then sits back surveying what it believes is a vast kingdom that it reigns over.
But that nature is in truth a sad, little coward. An "Emperor without Clothes", tricked into believing that Life has limits and that these limits should never be disturbed.
It takes effort to break free from the inner empire of inertia. Don't I know it. I have experienced it 100's of times in these very pages. But the effort is ALWAYS rewarded. Always. And the rewards are always greater than anything I could've even imagined back in the world of "Don't Try".
Glad to take a first step this morning in a new direction. Let's see what there is to see.
Some simple beauty...one leaf...quietly waiting in the morning rain for me to discover...Ahh. Glad I looked up.
