Sweet Reminders

~ SWEET REMINDER ~
Ponderings, Poems & Practices
for Living Your Brilliance!

Hello Beloved,

I want to touch the heart of the world and make it smile

– Charles de Lint –

And how is it that I touch the heart of the world?

I think that it’s as simple as this: rest into the me-ness of me.

Drop my seriousness.

Skip the drama and the idea that there is any time or place more exquisitely perfect than this moment. Especially when this particular moment appears to be fucked-up.

Hang out with the gurus who barely come up to my knees.

Rest my back against the faithfulness of the old saman tree.

Dance. Sing. Breathe deeply.

And as I write this I know that the “touching of the heart of the world” isn’t a doing touch at all; it’s opening to that me-ness I began with. Any efforting is contrived and moves me away from what is beautifully true: there is nothing to do.

SO, I invite the world to touch me, and I smile.

With love,
Sharon

~ SWEET REMINDER ~
Ponderings, Poems & Practices
for Living Your Brilliance!

Beloved One,

It is Easter morning and I woke up with you on my mind and in my heart.

For the past few days I have been marinading in Fred LaMotte’s recent Facebook post.

Each time I come back to these words they piece deeper and deeper into my remembering of things true and beautiful.

It is certainly a Sweet Reminder to me. Maybe it will speak to you, too.

With love, remembering and possibilities,
Sharon

Shared with gratitude from Fred LaMotte

AN EASTER MESSAGE FROM ISSA:

How wonderful that the three great Western religions all have their most holy day now, and in one place!

And they are bombing each other. Well, the Jews and Muslims are bombing each other there in Jerusalem.

The Christians are bombing each other in Ukraine. In fact, the Christians have been bombing the whole world. Our own nation is the leading arms seller on earth.

Something has gone terribly wrong in the religion business. Explaining this is above my pay grade, so I sat an hour with Issa in the garden and asked him about it. “Surely, the religion we’ve got now is not what you intended. Please help me understand!”

So he gave me this simple message for Easter. I’m sure he won’t mind if I share it with you, and try to put the pure streaming nectar of his love into words…
______________________
“Savor your own breath as my Holy Spirit; this is the anointing of the Christ.

While still on earth, taste each photon of your flesh as infinite light; this is my Resurrection.

Welcome all into the radiance shining from your chest; this is my Kingdom.

Crucify my otherness, glorify me as your Self; to suffer is to cling to an ever-perishing outward form.

Be risen from the tomb of the past into the garden of this moment.
I taught this simple Gospel before entering eternal samadhi as your very Presence.

What does it mean to say that I am risen, ascended to the right hand of God? It means, I have become the silent Witness within you.

Now feel my compassion as your own true nature. Have a joyful feast, share everything.

Billions of years ago, this Easter feast began, when the Breath of Creation offered the stars, the galaxies, garlands of galaxies, to her Beloved.

He witnessed her whirling in silent wonder; for he is the wonder and she is the dance.

You were her offering too, a trembling flame in the mirror of his love.

Who said that you sinned before you were born?

I say you were whole, you were divine, you were a perfect offering, when the stars first sang.

I say, you are washed in beauty with each inhalation.

Then why did our Mother, the Breath of Creation, make offerings? A hyacinth, the moon, your embryo, this tear?

So that God may taste God in every creature; for the cosmos is not an atonement, but a celebration.

Have a joyful feast. Share everything.

~ SWEET REMINDER ~
Ponderings, Poems & Practices
for Living Your Brilliance!

Hello Beloved,

As I move into a new home and chapter in my life, I’ve taken a pause from sending these Sweet Reminders. I think I’ll be back writing to you soon but I’m sending this note today to share an invitation from a dear friend of mine, Nathalie Himmelrich.

Nathalie is offering a free webinar on grief and grieving: 3 Keys For Embracing Life After Loss. It’s this coming Thursday. There are more details at the end of this note.

Oh, Grief. It’s woven through our lives. There are the griefs that bring us to our knees. We wonder if we’ll ever be able to take a deep breath again, or even if we will ever want to take that deep breath. And there are the everyday griefs that we might ignore, trivialize or judge as too petty to sit with.

Yesterday my grief-heart was touched listening to Ada Limón recite her poem After The Fire. Maybe her poem will speak to you, too.

With love to you and our tender, grieving parts,
Sharon

~~~*~
After the Fire

by Ada Limón

You ever think you could cry so hard
that there’d be nothing left in you, like
how the wind shakes a tree in a storm
until every part of it is run through with
wind? I live in the low parts now, most
days a little hazy with fever and waiting
for the water to stop shivering out of the
body. Funny thing about grief, its hold
is so bright and determined like a flame,
like something almost worth living for.

3 Keys for Embracing Life After Loss

Free Live webinar, Thursday March 9th,
10 am Pacific, 1 pm Eastern, 7 pm GMT
(Live Encore Saturday, March 11th, 9 am Pacific, 12 pm Eastern, 5 pm GMT )

There are many myths out there that tell you how to grieve, how to not grieve, and when it is time to stop grieving. But they are just not true.

Nathalie has been there. She’s struggled with the loss of her daughter, her mother, her marriage, and more. And through it all, in her journey to integrate her grief and transform her life after loss, she discovered ways to thrive, find meaning and live a purposeful life. In Nathalie’s free LIVE webinar,
3 Keys for Embracing Life After Loss she’ll teach you how to do just that.

I encourage you to attend. You’ll discover your capacity to find meaning again and embrace your life!

~ SWEET REMINDER ~
Ponderings, Poems & Practices
for Living Your Brilliance!

Happy New Year, Beloved.

As we begin of this new year I want to share a few goodies I’ve enjoyed during these past holy days. May they nourish, encourage and bless you.

With love to you,
Sharon

A Good Day A 6 minute video of loving gratitude and inspiration from Br. David Steindl-Hast

The Inner Landscape of Beauty An On Being Podcast
I cherish this conversation between John O’Donohue & Krista Tippett. It’s honey to my heart and soul and I come back to it over and over again. It was originally aired in 2008 and was one of John’s last interviews before his death.
50 mins edited version
98 min unedited version

Beauty isn’t all about just nice loveliness. Beauty is about more rounded, substantial becoming. So I think beauty in that sense is about an emerging fullness, a greater sense of grace and elegance, a deeper sense of depth, and also a kind of homecoming for the enriched memory of your unfolding life.

Beannacht/ Blessing
for a new year

On the day when
the weight deadens
on your shoulders
and you stumble,
may the clay dance
to balance you.

And when your eyes
freeze behind
the grey window
and the ghost of loss
gets into you,
may a flock of colours,
indigo, red, green
and azure blue,
come to awaken in you
a meadow of delight.

When the canvas frays
in the currach of thought
and a stain of ocean
blackens beneath you,
may there come across the waters
a path of yellow moonlight
to bring you safely home.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
may the clarity of light be yours,
may the fluency of the ocean be yours,
may the protection of the ancestors be yours.

And so may a slow
wind work these words
of love around you,
an invisible cloak
to mind your life.

John O’Donohue

~*~*~*~

~ Blessed Be ~

~ SWEET REMINDER ~
Ponderings, Poems & Practices
for Living Your Brilliance!

Hello Beloved,

It happened early one morning while the day was gently waking up. I was enjoying a gorgeous walk along the gravel roads, under the astonishing saman trees and I was thinking about the many things I’m thankful for. Suddenly, with a long, wonderful list tumbling around in my head, I realized that was all I was doing. Thinking. Thinking about what I am thankful for.

It was a surprising moment to realize how distant I was from actually feeling what I was thankful for.

So I stopped. I settled into a breath. Then I settled into my body and her longing to be saturated in the feeling of thanks, appreciation and gratitude.

I didn’t need a long list of thankfuls. Slipping deeply into a full body immersion of thankfulness for just one simple thing made all the difference. I was thankful that I had the ability to feel.

And then I felt thankful for everything.

And of course, as the story often goes, a few days after that precious walk these beautiful words about gratitude came to me from Fred LaMotte. Perfect to share with you today.

Deeply feeling thankful for you,
Sharon

Gratitude
Fred LaMotte

Gratitude is not a spiritual practice. It is not something you need to “do.” Gratitude is a subtle thread of starlight that binds your pulse, through sensations of sweetness, to the heart of the galaxy. Just follow one faint breath of thanks until you dissolve.

Into what? There is no answer. You must find out for yourself, with the quietest kind of courage. Be grateful for the least most insignificant blessing: last petal on the autumn rose, a lock of golden fur from the dog who died, a tear without a cause, the sound of hummingbirds on a Winter afternoon.

You’ll spiral down a dark stairwell to the wine cellar in your rib cage, where Jesus has patiently aged his blood in a cask of delicate unbroken bones. Don’t look for his face. Such grapes as these were crushed long ago. Meet him in the pure bouquet of silence. Savor the hollow of not knowing. His poverty will make you rich.

The secret? One atom of the smallest is vaster than the vast. A photon the width of an angel’s wing, inscribed with distant nebulae. The flavor of Mary in bee nectar. A particle of her grace on your tongue. A morsel of bread dipped in the Pleiades. You have everything, my friend, absolutely everything right here. Just follow one faint breath of thanks until you dissolve.

~ Shared with gratitude ~

~ SWEET REMINDER ~
Ponderings, Poems & Practices
for Living Your Brilliance!

Hello Beloved,

Over the past six months this poem by Padraig O Tuama has come to me several times. Each reading has wrapped me in comfort.

It brings me into gratitude for our messy, marvelous, miraculous lives. As we step into Thanksgiving week it seems like a special poem to share.

At the end of the poem I’ve added a link to a version of this poem read by Padraig. It’s beautiful.

With all love to you and your dear ones,
Sharon

The Facts of Life
by Padraig O Tuama

That you were born
and you will die.

That you will sometimes love enough
and sometimes not.

That you will lie
if only to yourself.

That you will get tired.

That you will learn most from the situations
you did not choose.

That there will be some things that move you
more than you can say.

That you will live
that you must be loved.

That you will avoid questions most urgently in need of
your attention.

That you began as the fusion of a sperm and an egg
of two people who once were strangers
and may well still be.

That life isn’t fair.
That life is sometimes good
and sometimes better than good.

That life is often not so good.

That life is real
and if you can survive it, well,
survive it well
with love
and art
and meaning given
where meaning’s scarce.

That you will learn to live with regret.
That you will learn to live with respect.

That the structures that constrict you
may not be permanently constraining.

That you will probably be okay.

That you must accept change
before you die
but you will die anyway.

So you might as well live
and you might as well love.
You might as well love.
You might as well love.

~*~*~*~

Here is a beautiful video of Padriag reading The Facts of Life, accompanied by The Vespertine Quintet’s rendition of Þú Ert Jörðin by Olafur Arnalds.

It’s a treat
~ Enjoy ~

~ SWEET REMINDER ~
Ponderings, Poems & Practices
for Living Your Brilliance!

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Hello Dear One,

Lately life has felt like a wild ride. It’s been fun, creative and exciting, and it’s been” take-my-breath-away” shocking and heart-wrenching.

A long-ago memory of me on a raft that was being swept downstream by a fierce river current just popped into my mind. Some crazy sh*t happened and I was holding on with all my might for an out-of-control wild ride. (For my river running friends: Selway River. High water. Class 4 stretch below Moose Creek Junction. Just sayin’)

Yep. My life has been feeling a little like that.

But a shift happened on that raft. Suddenly and surprisingly I became absolutely present to respond in that timeless, slow-mo matrix way.

And these days, when the out-of-control-ness flares up, to bring myself back home to my body and that slowing of time, I’ve been turning to one of the treasured practices I learned from Byron Katie. Like many potent practices, its simple but not easy. Katie calls it “The Morning Walk.”

Not only have I been practicing on my walks, I come to this when I’m sitting on the terrace. Just gently and simply noticing what is here right now.

Calming. Grounding. Settling.

Grace.

Below, I’m sharing that practice with you. You don’t have to wait until the ride is wild. This practice can be luscious anytime. Play with this and see what it holds for you.

Happy Exploring!

With love right here,
Sharon

* You can find Byron Katie leading you through this on YouTube and the Insight Timer App

MORNING WALK
with gratitude to Byron Katie

*Walk in silence.

*Begin by seeing everything around you, as if you’ve never seen this before. Look at your surroundings as if they had no name.

*Walk this way for for 10 – 20 minutes ( or 10 -20 seconds)

*As you walk, practice naming the world – “the scene” – to yourself as if you are God creating and naming things for the very first time.

*Announce to the “thing” and to yourself its name in each moment. As you walk, what do you actually see right now physically? Name it.

*Stay with “first-generation” thoughts. For example:
sky, flower, insect, tree, cement, shoe, woman.

*As you notice thoughts moving one more generation away, such as tree with leaves; old beautiful tree; or this tree would be great to sit under-stop! Just notice.

*Return to simple one-word, first-generation names:
ground, sky, woman, etc.

~ SWEET REMINDER ~
Ponderings, Poems & Practices
for Living Your Brilliance!

The world needs you more than the world needs what you do.

I came across this as I prowled through my old journal entries, the original source long forgotten. The quote hit me like a gust of fresh air. I’ve been in the busy world of house building and there is a heck of a lot of “to do’s” going on. I was reminded to stop and smile at the part of me that likes to do, do, do.

The world needs ME more than it needs what I do. I’m paying enough attention to see that what we DO is honored in these words, too. It can be easy to jump into shaming or judging the” to-do”-er but certainly the world needs the gifts we bring through our doings.

This quote gently turned me to the heart of where I long my doing to flow from: the undefended, quirky, joy-filled presence that brings the flavor of ME to Life.

A song, a dance, two breaths, a belly laugh, a smiling heart – It’s the simple things like those that bring ME to the world. From there the flavor of my doing is infused with the ME the world so desperately needs.

I’m curious, what brings you home to yourself when the doing takes over?

The world needs YOU.
With love, a smile and a breath,
Sharon

~ SWEET REMINDER ~
Ponderings, Poems & Practices
for Living Your Brilliance!

Beloved,

When was the last time you felt a welcoming carpet of sweet grass snuggled around your feet; the fresh dew adoring you with sweet, tender kisses?

When was the last time you slipped your weary bare feet into the clear frigid water of a mountain stream or a city park fountain? Do you remember being greeted with invigorating refreshment?

Do you remember wiggling your feet into slippery, gooey mud that squish up between your toes? Have you noticed, in child’s play mud and giggles go hand-in-hand?

Stop there, in the dew-damp blades of life. Or on a patch of warm, bare soil. Or on a pebbly path or sandy beach. Wherever you are, wherever you go, our earth graciously rises to meet you.

Beloved, are the souls of your feet hungry for Mother Earth? Take off those shoes. Stand still. Can you feel her heart beat? When you listen with your feet do you feel the inhale and exhale of her breath? Do you hear the love song she is singing? Listen closely, it’s a song just for you.

~*~*~
I do not
Want to step so quickly
Over this sacred place on God’s body
That is right beneath your
Own foot

As I
Dance with
Precious Life
Today.
~*~*~
From the Persian Poet,Hafiz

With Barefooted Love,
Sharon

~ SWEET REMINDER ~
Ponderings, Poems & Practices
for Living Your Brilliance!

Hello Dear One,

Georgia O’Keeffe said,
“When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, it’s your world for the moment.”

Isn’t it marvelous, the way all of our senses invite us into this astonishing world …

Each sound
That touch
This smell
Every taste
Any vision

Wondrously, this portal to presence is available to you any moment and right now.

Just stop, fully give your attention to a little part of your world, and open yourself to astonishment.

It’s YOUR world!

With love,
Sharon

~*~*~*~ After the Fire

~~~*~
After the Fire