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Archive for March, 2012

One of the Greatest Discoveries of Our Era

Posted in good life, happiness, healing, hope, mental health, positive psychology, resiliance, transformation, tagged , , , on March 26, 2012| 1 Comment »

Diane Ackerman wrote in the New York Times, “A relatively new field, called interpersonal neurobiology, draws its vigor from one of the great discoveries of our era: that the brain is constantly rewiring itself based on daily life. In the end, what we pay the most attention to defines us. How you choose to spend the irreplaceable hours of your life literally transforms you.” A message well worth reminding ourselves of daily.

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When all that’s left of me is Love

Posted in healing, hope, Uncategorized, tagged , , , on March 25, 2012| Leave a Comment »

  I just finished Linda Campanella’s book, “When all that’s Left if Me is Love: A Daughter’s Story of Letting Go” about a daughter’s experiences supporting a mother who is LIVING with small cell lung cancer. I stress LIVING because that is exactly what her mother did. She LIVED right up until she died and Campanella remained determined and committed to helping her mother do exactly that throughout the entire process – to LIVE as fully as possible.

One example of how they made the most of each and every day was that around 4:00 in the afternoon Linda, her mother, her father, and anyone else who happened to be in the house at the time settled in to celebrate ‘happy hour’. There was much laughter during this time, and the sharing of news, stories, small gifts, and great love. No one in the room was in denial of death or free from grief, however each was acutely aware in the moment of how precious life is when savored, how beautiful and even luminous in can be in the face of its impending loss.

While Campanella’s book contained heart break and grief, it also offered me, a daughter whose own mother was diagnosed with small cell lung cancer in August of 2010, much needed comfort and perspective. While I have so often felt powerless when confronting my mother’s cancer, Campenella has reminded me of my families’ strength and essential proficiencies. We are masters of loving, and as we weave our love throughout each and every moment that we’re together, we can create a sacred container which honors life and offers healing even in the absence of cure.

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Celtic Wisdom and John O’ Donohue

Posted in Uncategorized on March 13, 2012| Leave a Comment »

 

In “Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom,” poet, John O’ Donohue wrote, “though the human body is born complete in one moment, the birth of the human heart is an ongoing process.  It is being birthed in every experience of your life.  Everything that happens to you  has the potential to deepen you.” 

I know from the depths of my own life that his words are true.  I haven’t always known this.  In fact, it’s been a lesson which I’ve needed to learn over and over again before it finally settled securely into my consciousness.  My own heart has had to break more than once before I entertained  the possibility that the light that  came pouring through its cracks would not blind or burn, but illuminate.  

Playwright, Arthur Miller observed, “possibly the greatest truths we know, have come out of people’s suffering. The problem is not to undo suffering, or to wipe it off the face of the earth, but to make it inform our lives…” I’ve always been a reluctant student when confronted with the lessons of suffering and will never welcome this particular teacher.  Still, I’ve come to believe that its lessons are most always far more profound than those delivered by my gentler instructors.

While I fail to consistently keep it, I make this promise to myself  repeatedly, “I will open myself to the potential for wisdom that lives within each and every experience of  my life.” 

 

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Mother Wisdom Speaks

Posted in Uncategorized on March 6, 2012| Leave a Comment »

This past weekend I attended a retreat entitled, “The Spirit of Aging” at Living Waters Spiritual Center. It was a special time to reflect, connect, and renew — and I needed it.

Karen Lewis Foley, unitarian minister, spiritual director, and our retreat leader read an absolutely beautiful poem entitled, “Mother Wisdom Speaks” that resonated deeply with me.

Mother Wisdom Speaks

Some of you I will hollow out.
I will make you a cave.
I will make you so deep the stars will shine in your darkness.
You will be a bowl.
You will be the cup in the rock collecting rain.

I will hollow you with knives.
I will not do this to make you clean.
I will not do this to make you pure.
You are clean already.
You are pure already.

I will do this because the world needs the hollowness of you.
I will do this for the space that you will be.
I will do this because you must be large.

A passage.
People will find their way through you.
A bowl.
People will eat from you and their hunger will not weaken them unto death.
A cup to catch the sacred rain.

My daughter, do not cry. Do not be afraid.
Nothing you need will be lost.
I am shaping you.
I am making you ready.

Light will flow in your hollowing.
You will be filled with light.
Your bone will shine.

The round, open center of you will be radiant.
I will call you Brilliant One.
I will call you Daughter who is wide.
I will call you Transformed.

By Christin Lore Weber

Do not be afraid. You are being shaped. You are being made ready…..

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