“Pain pushes until vision pulls.” – Rev. Deborah Johnson

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

― Marianne Williamson, A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of “A Course in Miracles”

The Way to Start a Day – Byrd Baylor

The way to start a day is this –

Go outside and face the east and greet the sun

with some kind of blessing or chant or song

that you made yourself and keep for early morning.

the way to make the song is this –

Don’t try to think what words to use

until you’re standing there alone.

When you feel the sun

you’ll feel the song, too.

Just sing it.

But don’t think you’re the only one who ever worked that magic.

Your caveman brothers knew what to do.

Your cavewoman sisters knew, too.

They sang to help the sun come up.

and lifted their hands to its power.

A morning needs to be sung to.

A new day needs to be honored.

People have always known that.

Didn’t they chant at dawn in the sun temples of Peru?

And leap and sway to Aztec flutes in Mexico?

And drum sunrise songs in the Congo?

And ring a thousand small gold bells in China?

Didn’t the pharaohs of Egypt say the only sound at dawn

should be the sound at dawn

should be the sound of songs that please the morning sun?

They knew what songs to sing.

People always seemed to know.

and everywhere they knew what gifts the sun wanted.

In som places they gave gold.

In some places they gave glowers.

In some places, sacred smoke blown to the four directions.

Some places, feathers and good thoughts.

Som places, fire.

But everywhere they knew to give something.

And everywhere they knew to turn their faces eastward

as the sun came up.

Some people still know.

When the first pale streak of light cuts through the darkness,

wherever they are,

those people make offerings

and send mysterious song songs to the sun.

They know exactly how to start a day.

Their blessing float on the wind over Pueablo cornfields

in New Mexico, and you hear their morning songs

in villages in Africa,

and they salute the sunrise ceremonially

in the high cold mountains of Peru.

Today long before dawn they were already waiting in Japan with prayers

and they were gathering at little shrines in India

with marigolds in their hands.

They were bathing int he sacred Ganges River as the sung cam up.

And high on a mesa in Arizona

they were holding a baby toward the sun.

They were speaking ithe child’s new name

so the sun would henna nd know that child.

It had to be sunrise.

and it had to be that first sudden moment.

That’s when all the power of life is in the sky.

Some people say there is a new sound every day,

that it begins its life at dawn

and lives for one day only.

They say you have to welcome it.

You have to make the sun happy.

You have to make a good day for it.

You have to make a good world for it

to live it’s one-day life in.

and the way to start , they say,

is just by looking east at day.

When they look  east tomorrow, you can too.

Your song will be an offering –

and you’ll be tone more person

in mone more place

at one more time int htworld

saying hello to the sun,

Letting it know you are there.

If the sky turns a color sky never was before

just watch it.

That’s part of the magic.

That’s the way to start a day.

Jailbreak by Maya Spector

It’s time to break out –

Jailbreak time.

Time to push our way out of

the dark winter prison.

Lilacs are doin git

in Suden explosions of soft purple,

And the jasmine vines, and ranunculus, too.

There is no jailer powerful enough

to hold Spring contained.

Let that be a lesson.

Stop holding back the blossoming!

Quit shutting eyes and gritting teeth,

curling gingers into fists, hunching shoulders.

Lose your determination to remain unchanged.

All the forces of nature want you to open.

Their gentle nudge carries behind it

the force of a flash flood.

Why make a cell your home

when the door is unlocked

and the garden is waiting for you?

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