State of the Garden


As I have walked around town enjoying the spring surge of blossoming trees, I found myself remembering that our most famous cherry blossoms were a gift from the Japanese, which remembrance sent a deeper yearning to help send healing.
At one sunny, pink-blossomed drenched moment yesterday, I found myself asking how could one’s heart not reach out to a people who brought us such beauty. I then thought that this country had no problem incarcerating “those” people on “our” soil and bombing their country when the arrival of the gift of our famous cherry trees was still in living memory. At that time, “they” had become our country’s enemies because of the actions and statements of those in power. The gift had become irrelevant in the context of war.
The peril in both thoughts is that they distance us from opening and relating to the essential identity and humanity in all of the individuals we meet of various nationalities and alliances–whether in a time of gift-giving or in a time when we cannot abide the actions or ideas of those in power.
Peace and light, E — Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.
For the past week, I have had laryngitis. Obviously, this resulted in my being more selective about when I was going to speak and what I was going to say. Less obvious, was that the limitations on speaking led me to listen more carefully. Listening more carefully helped me choose what to say and when to speak. At a surface level, this did not change whether I was analyzing or judging. It just led me to be more discriminating. As I pondered this issue, though, I found myself wanted to listen more freely, to try and listen first without analysis, without judgment, without any anticipated response. This was, then, even a listening to my temporary limitation. Not judging it, not lamenting it, not trying to change it (although I treated the cough and the sore throat), but listening to what was there. This deep listening to the body, to events, to what comes to us (in conversation or otherwise), can lead us to the true deepness of meditation — true listening for how spirit speaks to us.