Tuesday, July 21, 2015

Waking Moment


As babes we are born with a tabla raza (blank slate) upon which all that we choose, all that comes to us and goes forth from us forms our own personalities and affects the world we live in.  

David Whyte suggests that maybe the same image could apply to our daily risings, for this day and for as long as we live. He has a suggestion about what to remember as we awaken, “in that first hardly noticed moment ...”


WHAT TO REMEMBER WHEN WAKING

In that first

hardly noticed

moment

to which you wake,

coming back to this life

from the other

more secret,

moveable

and frighteningly

honest

world

where everything

began,

there is a small

opening

into the new day

which closes

the moment

you begin

your plans.


What you can plan

is too small

for you to live.


What you can live

wholeheartedly

will make plans

enough

for the vitality

hidden in your sleep.


To be human

is to become visible

while carrying

what is hidden

as a gift to others. 


To remember

the other world

in this world

is to live in your

true inheritance.


You are not

a troubled guest

on this earth,

you are not

an accident

amidst other accidents

you were invited

from another and greater

night

than the one

from which

you have just emerged.


Now, looking through

the slanting light

of the morning

window toward

the mountain

presence

of everything

that can be,

what urgency

calls you to your

one love?  What shape

waits in the seed

of you to grow

and spread

its branches

against a future sky?


Is it waiting

in the fertile sea?

In the trees

beyond the house?

In the life

you can imagine

for yourself?

In the open

and lovely

white page

on the waiting desk?


-David Whyte (The House of Belonging)


Renee Domeier, OSB

No comments:

Post a Comment