2019

Posted on June 20, 2019 by Jo Beall

“Refugees are mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, children, with the same hopes and ambitions as us—except that a twist of fate has bound their lives to a global refugee crisis on an unprecedented scale.”
~ Khaled Hosseini ~

~

Today is the 19th annual World Refugee Day. The United Nations Refugee Agency sponsors this day recognizing and raising awareness about the world’s obligation to welcome and shelter refugees—those forced to flee violence or disaster in their home land.

On 4 December 2000, the United Nations General Assembly in Resolution 55/76 decided that, from 2001, 20 June would be celebrated as World Refugee Day. In this resolution, the General Assembly noted that 2001 marked the 50th anniversary of the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees.

World Refugee Day reminds us that all human beings are valuable, we all deserve protections, and we are all personally obligated to care for one another.

Now More Than Ever, We Need to Stand with Refugees…

~

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” ~ MLK ~

~

let us create a world of peace built on justice and guided by love…

Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 6 – Day 185 – 6/19/2019

Posted on June 19, 2019 by Jo Beall

On June 19, 1964, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was approved after surviving an 83-day filibuster in the United States Senate. Ninety-nine years earlier, on June 19, 1865, we celebrated the first African-American Emancipation Day, the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States… Let us celebrate today with the words of President Obama on June 19. 2016…

~

“Just outside the Oval Office hangs a painting depicting the night of December 31, 1862. In it, African-American men, women, and children crowd around a single pocket watch, waiting for the clock to strike midnight and the Emancipation Proclamation to take effect. As the slaves huddle anxiously in the dimly lit room, we can sense how even two more minutes seems like an eternity to wait for one’s freedom. But the slaves of Galveston, Texas, had to wait more than two years after Lincoln’s decree and two months after Appomattox to receive word that they were free at last.

Today we commemorate the anniversary of that delayed but welcome news. Decades of collective action would follow as equality and justice for African-Americans advanced slowly, frustratingly, gradually, on our nation’s journey toward a more perfect union. On this Juneteenth, we remember that struggle as we reflect on how far we’ve come as a country. The slaves of Galveston knew their freedom was only a first step, just as the bloodied foot soldiers who crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge 100 years later knew they had to keep marching.

Juneteenth is a time to recommit ourselves to the work that remains undone. We remember that even in the darkest hours, there is cause to hope for tomorrow’s light. Today, no matter our race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation, we recommit ourselves to working to free modern-day slaves around the world and to honoring in our own time the efforts of those who fought so hard to steer our country truer to our highest ideals.”

~

may we be… free at last… free at last…

Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 6 – Day 184 – 6/18/2019

Posted on June 18, 2019 by Jo Beall

“Empty yourself of everything. Let the mind rest at peace. The ten thousand things rise and fall while the Self watches their return. They grow and flourish and then return to the Source. Returning to the Source is stillness, which is the way of Nature. The way of Nature is unchanging.” ~Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching

~

today is such a day, a day of emptying everything and lying in the sacred space of the beyond, the galactic center, the cosmic womb, primordial space of birthing stars… still under the sway of this luminous moon of blessings, may we join in the practice of metta, lovingkindness with a thousand thousandfold beings…

~

may our hearts burst open in unconditional love

may our minds be illumined by a peace passing all understanding

may our bodies be flooded with central sun’s light

may our spirits touch all that is with our transforming radiant presence

~

Peace to all beings
Whether near or far
Known or unknown
Real or imaginary
Visible or invisible
Born or yet to be born.
May all beings
Be well and happy
And free from fear.
Peace to all beings
Within and beyond the imagination
In the world of ideas
In the world of memories
And in the world of dreams.
May all beings
Be well and happy
And free from fear.
Peace in all elements
Of earth, air, fire and water
Fulfilled in space
Peace.
Peace in all universes
From the smallest cells in our bodies
To the greatest galaxies in space
Peace
And light rising
Peace to all beings
Within each being here
To those beings that have been in the past
And to those beings that are yet to be in the future
May all beings
Within each being here
Be well and happy
And free from fear.

~

Take all that I say,
And toss away
All that does not
Resonate
For we do not learn
Wisdom and Love
We re-member what’s within…

Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 6 – Day 183 – 6/17/2019

Posted on June 17, 2019 by Jo Beall

You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.

– Buddha –

according to the tibetan buddhist lunar calendar, this potent full moon is the one under which we re-member the buddha’s binth death and enlightenenment and is celebrated as Saka Dawa, month of the Saka star…

today marks another remarkable moment – on this day ninety-one years ago, another first flight took place when Amelia Earhart embarked on the first trans-Atlantic flight by a woman… flying from Newfoundland to Wales in 21 hours, she captured our imagination forever… her legendary feats are the very emblem of courage — and of a being who refused to let fears and adversity ground her dreams… let’s take this moment to revel in her flight and soar…

~

The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity. The fears are paper tigers. You can do anything you decide to do. You can act to change and control your life; and the procedure, the process is its own reward.

Everyone has oceans to fly, if they have the heart to do it. Is it reckless? Maybe. But what do dreams know of boundaries?

No borders, just horizons – only liberation.

Courage is the price that life exacts for granting peace.

~

love in a way that frees…

Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 6 – Day 182 – 6/16/2019

Posted on June 16, 2019 by Jo Beall

This body is not me.

I am not limited by this body.

I am life without boundaries.

I have never been born,

and I have never died.

Look at the ocean and the sky filled with stars, manifestations from my wondrous true mind.

Since before time, I have been free.

Birth and death are only doors through which we pass, sacred thresholds on our journey.

Birth and death are a game of hide- and seek.

So laugh with me,

hold my hand,

let us say good-bye,

say good-bye, to meet again soon.

We meet today.

We will meet again tomorrow.

We will meet at the source every moment.

We meet each other in all forms of life.

~By Thich Nhat Hanh, Chanting and Recitations from Plum Village. Page 188.

welcome to this moment on this astonishing light of being day when the winds are perfect for contemplating the supreme meditation on death and re-birth… i love the rhythm that on this sixteenth day, the mantra i chanted daily in 2016 is coming to the fore beginning with my awakening in the sacred space of graceland, the consciousness of original blessing with death on our left shoulder, our constant companion inspiring us to meet each moment fully, to meet it as a friend…

what a blessing to rest here with you today as we walk each other home, sitting in the dynamic stillness of silence, the powerful place beyond words where we feel the interconnection, beloved communion of the one syncing into the interbeing of beginningless time as frequencies sounding vibrations of love, joy, compassion and harmony through the instrument of peace we be…

thank you for lighting the way today…

Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 6 – Day 181 – 6/15/2019

Posted on June 15, 2019 by Jo Beall

feeling in sync with brother sun today

slowing… stilling… listening in a deeper way

floating under waxing full moon into the heart cave

pulsing at the frequency of cosmic compassion wave

blessing the space of grace where we interbe

transmitting lovingkindness wordlessly

~

yes, for this moment, let’s be the space of grace…. smiling to start our internal love engine, let’s reach out to one another to pass the love around the world and as we breathe in deeply through our one one heart, feel our belly, our core, our heart cave expanding as we chant together…

may we be filled with lovingkindness

may we be well

may we be peaceful and at ease

may we be happy…

~

may we be at peace

may our one heart remain open

may we real-eyes the beauty of our true nature

may we know the astonishing light of our being

may we be a source of healing for all and behold the wonder of each moment…

Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 6 – Day 180 – 6/14/2019

Posted on June 15, 2019 by Jo Beall

Quiet friend who has come so far,
feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,
what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.
In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.
And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.
Sonnets to Orpheus, Part Two, XXIX — Rainer Maria Rilke
~
Let difficulty transform you. And it will. In my experience, we just need help in learning how not to run away.
~ Pema Chodron ~
What is Freedom?
But it’s not impermanence per se, or even knowing we’re going to die, that is the cause of our suffering, the Buddha taught. Rather, it’s our resistance to the fundamental uncertainty of our situation. Our discomfort arises from all of our efforts to put ground under our feet, to realize our dream of constant okayness. When we resist change, it’s called suffering. But when we can completely let go and not struggle against it, when we can embrace the groundlessness of our situation and relax into its dynamic quality, that’s called enlightenment, or awakening to our true nature, to our fundamental goodness. Another word for this is freedom—freedom from struggling against the fundamental ambiguity of being human.
Excerpted from:
Living Beautifully
with Uncertainty and Change
by Pema Chödrön
pages 6–7
~

“Many people, especially ignorant people, want to punish you for speaking the truth, for being correct, for being you. Never apologize for being correct, or for being years ahead of your time. If you’re right and you know it, speak your mind. Speak your mind. Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is still the truth.”
~ Gandhi ~
~
under the speaking truth moon waxing full, it is incumbent on us to trust the journey, to ponder Einstein’s question about whether we live in a friendly universe, to dance in stillness saying yes to the divine unfolding of mystery…

may our brokenheartedness break open our heart wider and deeper pouring out compassion…

Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 6 – Day 179 – 6/13/2019

Posted on June 13, 2019 by Jo Beall

along with the prayer of thank you, thank you, thank you, this prayer, these intentions are central to, are the organizing matrix of my life… on this day of beginning the 100 day countdown to the International Day of Peace on 9/21, this prayer picture needs sharing as does the message from the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres:

Every year on 21 September, the United Nations calls on all nations and people to put down their weapons and reaffirm their commitment to living in harmony with one another. Today, as we mark the 100-day countdown to the next International Day of Peace, I invite global reflection on this year’s timely theme.

“Climate Action for Peace” brings a clear message: the global climate emergency is a threat to security and stability. As coastal areas and degraded inland areas are becoming uninhabitable, millions of people are being forced to seek safety and better lives elsewhere. With extreme weather events and disasters becoming more frequent and severe, disputes over dwindling resources risk fueling climate-related conflict.

Last month, I visited the South Pacific and saw the challenges being endured by those on the frontlines of this existential danger. But it is not just remote islands whose future is in jeopardy. What is happening there is a sign of what is in store for all humankind. Urgent climate action is a global imperative.

To mobilize the ambition we need, I am convening a Climate Action Summit on 23 September, at UN Headquarters in New York. I have asked world leaders to come with concrete and realistic plans to rapidly accelerate action to implement the Paris Agreement, and to make a pivotal shift toward a cleaner, safer and greener future. In this endeavor, they will be backed by the passionate voices of young women and men around the world, who understand their future is at stake.

This is the [challenge] of our lives, and a race against time. We can win — and we must. Solutions are in our hands: tax pollution, not people; stop subsidizing fossil fuels; stop building new coal plants by 2020; focus on a green economy, not a grey economy. I count on your continued support as we strive to build a world where we can live every day in harmony with the environment and with each other.
~
yes, may we co-create a world of peace built on justice and guided by love, may it begin this moment and may it begin with me and thee…

thank you, thank you, thank you…

Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 6 – Day 178 – 6/12/2019

Posted on June 12, 2019 by Jo Beall

Your deepest presence is in every small contracting and expanding,
the two as beautifully balanced and coordinated
as birdwings.

~ Rumi ~

~

may we travel lightly with

more and more love

and more and more surrender

more and more love

and more and more surrender

more and more love

and more and more surrender

into the vast spaciousness of love

into the eternal chorus of the celestial realms with angelic beings re-joy-sing to earth beings below,

into the silent whispers of the stone peoples,

into the coyotes howling to the waxing moon,

into the twinkling eyes of children,

into your beloved’s hand holding yours promising never to forsake you,

into the smile of a stranger who is now a friend,

into the good, the true the beautiful, all that we can witness all over the planet in every moment through the eyes of love,

into the sweet nectar of love…

~

may we celebrate the collective dream of peace coming alive this moment…

blessed be!

Poetic PEACE Pilgrimage – Year 6 – Day 178 – 6/11/2019

Posted on June 11, 2019 by Jo Beall

it’s one of those days in the neighborhood, a day of brilliant sun warmly embracing…

The Sun

Have you ever seen
anything
in your life
more wonderful

than the way the sun,
every evening,
relaxed and easy,
floats toward the horizon

and into the clouds or the hills,
or the rumpled sea,
and is gone–
and how it slides again

out of the blackness,
every morning,
on the other side of the world,
like a red flower

streaming upward on its heavenly oils,
say, on a morning in early summer,
at its perfect imperial distance–
and have you ever felt for anything
such wild love–
do you think there is anywhere, in any language,
a word billowing enough
for the pleasure

that fills you,
as the sun
reaches out,
as it warms you

as you stand there,
empty-handed–
or have you too
turned from this world–

or have you too
gone crazy
for power,
for things?

~ Mary Oliver ~

love lights the sky…

Abundance Created Together (ACT)

This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love; the more they give, the more they possess. – Rainer Maria Rilke –

Monthly Archives: June 2019