today’s journey is rooted in the deep peace of the running wave flowing through us all as we journey onward into an equanimity passing understanding and experience the harmony of relatives getting along tune into a celestial harmony blending together the earthly tones of dissonance…
we journey in peace today to the friendship bell overlooking the pacific ocean… this bell was given by the people of Korea to the people of the United States in the hope that friendship between the nations would endure as would their faith in freedom and interdependence…
today’s peace retreat has me re-membering that
a thousand years ago, the Great Peacemaker came across the Great Lake Onondaga, now known as Ontario, in a stone canoe to the warring six-nation confederacy of the Haudenosaunee, also known as the Iroquois… gradually his words and actions won the people over, they accepted the Great Law of Peace and they buried their weapons under the Peace Tree by Lake Onondaga and formed councils for making wise choices together… in the Haudenosaunee, historians recognize the oldest known participatory democracy, one that inspired the founders in crafting the Constitution of the United States. …
let us be in this moment peacemakers of the earth mother following the teachings of the Great Peacemaker just as still do the Onondaga Nation, whose name means Keepers of the Central Fire, always beginning with prayers of thanksgiving…
THE PEOPLE
Today we have gathered and we see that the cycles of life continue. We have been given the duty to live in balance and harmony with each other and all living things. So now, we give greetings and thanks to each other as people.
Now our minds are one.
THE EARTH MOTHER
We are all thankful to our mother, the Earth, for she gives us all that we need for life. She supports our feet as we walk about upon her. It gives us joy that she continues to care for us as she has from the beginning of time. To our mother, we send greetings and thanks.
Now our minds are one.
THE ENLIGHTENED TEACHERS
We gather our minds to greet and thank the enlightened teachers who have come to help throughout the ages. When we forget how to live in harmony, they remind us of the way we were instructed to live as people. We send greetings and thanks to these caring teachers.
Now our minds are one.
THE CREATOR
Now we turn our thoughts to the creator, or great spirit, and send greetings and thanks for all the gifts of creation. Everything we need to live a good life is here on this Mother Earth. For all the love that is still around us, we gather our minds together as one and send our choicest words of greetings and thanks to the creator.
Now our minds are one.
CLOSING WORDS
We have now arrived at the place where we end our words. of all the things we have named, it was not our intention to leave anything out. If something was forgotten, we leave it to each individual to send such greetings and thanks in their own way.
Now our minds are one.
~
thanks be…
today whilst making that mythical journey of a thousand miles, i have so many moments to reflect on and appreciate this archetypal journey home into the present moment and to chant a continuous metta, lovingkindness for us all…
may we all be free from suffering
may we all be free from fear
may we all be free from anxiety
may we all be more loving
may we all be more trusting
may we all awaken to our true nature of peace and joy
on every step of this never ending journey, may i walk these simple words…
My simple prayer is that in all things I learn to love well.
That I learn to touch the ever-changing
seasons of life with a great heart of compassion.
That I live with the peace and justice
I wish for all earth.
That I learn to care fully and let go gracefully.
That I enjoy the abundance of the earth
and return to it from the natural generosity
that is our human birthright.
That through my own life,
through joy and sorrow,
in thought, work, and deed
I bring benefit and blessings to all that lives.
That my heart and the hearts of all beings
learn to be free.
~ Jack Kornfield ~
today, on the fifty-fourth anniversary of John F Kennedy’s assassination, i salute all poetic peace pilgrims with JFK’s invocation of peace… this quotation comes from his greatest speech ever, a commencement address given at American University some four and a half months before he was gunned down in Dallas… these words live on eternally as a clarion call for a peace for all time…
may we all awaken to the wisdom of this radical (rooted) vision of peace…
Oh Great Spirit who dwells in the sky,
lead us to the path of peace and understanding,
let all of us live together as brothers and sisters.
Our lives are so short here, walking upon Mother Earth’s surface,
let our eyes be opened to all the blessings you have given us.
Please hear our prayers, Oh Great Spirit.Native American Prayer
Peace is a daily, a weekly, a monthly process, gradually changing opinions, slowly eroding old barriers, quietly building new structures. And however undramatic the pursuit of peace, that pursuit must go on.
JFK
Gratitude is not only the greatest of all virtues, but the parent of all others.
~ Cicero ~
as the celebration of Thanks giving approaches in the USA and i approach the 6th anniversary of living lucidly in the abundance of infinite love and gratitude, i’m contemplating thankfulness and being thankfulness with every breath… it has been said that if we could bottle gratitude, it would be the best selling pharmaceutical, since so many health benefits derive from its application and use… i’ve had several spontaneous remissions since beginning the practice of saying thank you with every breath…
may we all awaken to being conscious witnesses and grateful participants in the blossoming of beauty…
into each life, some rain must fall…
rains of harmony driven by spirited winds inundated the realm of portalandia throughout the night reminding me of the lotus… did you know these flowers, when surrounded by fire or suffering or adversity become even more fragrant just as your light, your beauty awakens in such moments and your compassionate heart shines through… thanks be that our inner light can never be extinguished no matter how dark the times feel… so, gaze into this flower, breathe in the sweetness and connect even more deeply in this moment with the lotus lightness of being you are and evermore will be… deep bows…
on this day of sharing with you an image depicting the astonishing light of your being, i also want to offer, dear anam caras, soul friends, deep bows and overflowing thanks for your astonishing light that rekindles my own when the weight of the world becomes so heavy and then i feel your beating heart and re-member all is well…
now some words dedicated to all the astonishing lights shining across the cosmos….
If
If you can keep your head when all about youAre losing theirs and blaming it on you,If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,But make allowance for their doubting too;If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;If you can meet with Triumph and DisasterAnd treat those two impostors just the same;If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spokenTwisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:If you can make one heap of all your winningsAnd risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,And lose, and start again at your beginningsAnd never breathe a word about your loss;If you can force your heart and nerve and sinewTo serve your turn long after they are gone,And so hold on when there is nothing in youExcept the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,If all men count with you, but none too much;If you can fill the unforgiving minuteWith sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it…[and, you must be an anam cara or a dog or both…]~ Rudyard Kipling ~( except for the last line in brackets )thank you for shining brightly
’tis the season of things falling away
of the great turning and looking within
all the while smiling thank you, thank you, thank you
~
today’s new moon in scorpio of rebirth provides a perfect backdrop for celebrating thanksgiving and the culmination of such a whirlwind half turn around the sun back to the full moon in scorpio in may… are you feeling the magic and miracle of these potent energies teaching us and showing us the way to dwell deeply in the present moment, to come fully alive, re-membering this gift of being fully alive in this moment is how we serve the whole co-creating a cosmos of prace built on justice and guided by love…
~
Let us know peace.
For as long as the moon shall rise,
For as long as the rivers shall flow,
For as long as the sun shall shine,
For as long as the grass shall grow,
Let us know peace.~ Cheyenne Prayer ~
~
thank you, thank you, thank you to all relatives for walking the path home together…
as i write this post, we are six hours away from the new moon in scorpio, the highest point of rebirth energy for this turn around the sun… so very interesting that i declared yesterday as my rebirthday and today as well has been a wildfire of drawing down these potent rebirthing energies…
actually, this rebirthing process actually began back in may when i felt i had climbed to the mountain top to receive the burning tablets… life started heating up and combusting in july and then went into the whirlwind on 9/11… sixty-seven days later and feeling the emerging from the birth canal under this dark moon to plant seeds of light and love and peace and joy…
will you join me in contemplating this new moon/dark sky/empty field moment as a blank canvas of limitless possibilities where we can cosmically wash away the old allowing spaciousness for vibrant color to rush onto the scene… let the scorpio symbol of death and rebirth, the serpent, journey deeply into the ground of our being resetting our energy by shining light on the repressed or blocked or painful streams and transmuting the dammed waters into their natural flowing state of joy…
such a beautiful portal for this new moon, a magical moment when the veils are lifted for us to walk through the gateway and be directly wired into source, a moment to manifest miracles… thank you for joining me in bowing to this present moment, this eternal moment, a moment of lovingkindness and compassion, peace and harmony… namaste, beloveds…
~
smiling now, we flow
re-membering all is well
one with nature’s rhythms
~
on the 66th day in the 66th year of an awakening journey along the path of liberation, i am committing to this transforming spirit and love of peace, to making every breath a moment of peace built on justice and guided by love…
thank you for joining this quest. may we all…
make me an instrument of your peace,
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy;grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.for it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.~ St Francis of Assisi ~
