Labyrinths: Walking Meditations

by | Oct 4, 2018 | Reflections/Profiles

Worship outside of a church comes in many forms.  For the service, several members shared their ways of being mindful and growing spiritually. These included listening to music, engaging in specific meditation times, and singing. My contribution was this short talk on how walking a labyrinth daily has been an important part of 2018.  Since late December 2017, I have walked either the Phoenix Harmony Labyrinth or when traveling found a labyrinth to walk, or used a small cloth lap labyrinth and as a last resort, used my palm to mindfully walk a labyrinth.

“Carry On” Lyrics from the American Indie Pop group, FUN.

“If you’re lost and alone

Or you’re sinking like a stone

Carry on.

May your past be the sound of your feet upon the ground

Carry on.

Carry on, carry on.”

The lyrics of this song often scroll through my mind as I walk a labyrinth daily. Walking a labyrinth is my meditation.

The song reminds us that none of us is perfect.  We can chew on our faults, making them who we are.  Or we can acknowledge the negatives things like wrong doings, surliness, inconsideration, not listening and then we can choose,

Yes, we have a choice, to acknowledge positives in our lives and work towards them. To make them part of who we really are.

We are Holy Spirits Bound in Human Bodies. Frailly Divine you might say.

Walking a labyrinth daily provides me with this time and space. For me to pause…Ground…Center in the moment…and Mindfully walk with a Grateful Heart.

I give thanks: to the day and the season regardless of the weather; the plants and animals; our home; Rich and our families; our bounty.

I ask for blessings on those in need, trauma, who are far away, with whom I have had disagreements and whose actions I disagree with.

I ask Divine Love that is within me to help me remember to open my heart and mind to grace and compassion.

Walking the labyrinth helps me catch and dispel the grumpiness that sometimes overwhelms me.

Speaking scientifically, by choosing to center in gratitude I change the brainwaves by allowing neurotransmitters to reinforce certain pathways.  Positive pathways. I allow time for resolution of matters as I form habits of gratefulness and positivity.

Spiritually, this allows time and opens space to choose to walk mindfully; to invite in peacefulness that I work to carry through the day.

As I carry on, I remind myself that peace begins with me with the sound of my feet upon the ground.

From Abraham Maslow: “The most fortunate are those who have a wonderful capacity to appreciate again and again, freshly and naively, the basic goods of life, with awe, pleasure, wonder, and even ecstasy.”

From Linda Mikell, Veriditas Council member and skilled labyrinth facilitator, “People tell me time and again that the labyrinth has an aspect of awe and wonder about it.”

Swallowtail Soiree

by | Sep 7, 2018 | Bugs, Nature, Wonderment

Guest Blogger, Sheryl Ochs

On a jaunt to the garden to retrieve some herbs for my freshly cooked carrots, I paused in surprise to see 12 small black caterpillars, each with a tiny white stripe in the middle, chomping away on my only parsley plant.

Caterpillars on parsley.

Caterpillars happily munch parsley leaves.

I knew that parsley was a butterfly host plant, and I knew that Swallowtail butterflies were partial to it, but the only ones I’d noticed before were bigger, fatter and striped with yellow/green.

Seeking advice from a trusted website, I discovered the tiny black caterpillars were indeed the first instars of the caterpillars on their way to becoming Swallowtail butterflies. As I watched what I called “my children” grow, I saw each of the four instar stages in which they shed their skin.

Each morning and evening I’d head to the garden to make certain they had not succumbed to hungry birds or other predators and each time I was relieved to count 12.

Swallowtail Caterpillars

Caterpillars on parsley.

Before the caterpillars finally vacated, they mostly decimated my parsley leaving only a small sprig for my next dish of carrots. A small price to pay for the pleasure of watching them grow to adulthood. Now they’ve meandered off to form their chrysalises and I anxiously await an influx of beautiful butterflies to grace my yard.

 

Black Swallowtail Butterfly

Black Swallowtail butterfly on cup plant.

Take Time for Sunrises and Sunsets

by | Jun 21, 2018 | Geology/Weather, Nature, Reflections/Profiles, Wonderment

“Take Time. Make Time”
Guest Blogger
Connie Sjostrom

Sunrise

Sunrise comes early in Summer.

After working 40 years of my life, I was fortunate to be able to retire early.  Always a multi-tasker while I was a working mom, you can imagine that much of my spare time was, well, not really spare. I vowed early on that my children should not miss out on “mom time” because I was working. That meant that some other things had to give a little.  Like housework…that was easy

to cut. The only “extra time” I allowed myself before the family began to stir was a cup of coffee and a scan of the local paper WHILE I blow-dried my hair   But getting back to my original point: when I retired, I knew it was going to take a bit to adjust to my new normal of no schedule. I developed two mantras –the first, “Slow Me Down, Lord”, and the second followed “Take time, make time.”

Like time to watch the sunrise.

Farm Life

Growing up on a farm I saw few sunrises mostly because I was already in the barn milking and there wasn’t a lot of extra time in those days. Milking 50 cattle morning and night…usually with only two people milking. You get the picture.

Arkansas sunset

Arkansas Sunset
Photo by Connie Sjostrom

But, I saw lots of sunsets — mostly from a tractor. Back then we worked until it was dark, and sometimes later depending on the season. Still no camera handy. And if I did get a shot, I had to wait until the roll was full to get it developed. And usually, a few weeks for it to come back not to mention the trip to town to drop it off and pick it up. It was a real thing.

Commute

When we first married my husband and I enjoyed small town living but that involved a 45-minute commute to work and little extra time to catch the sunrise. Even when we moved to the country 27 years ago, I was still up early and getting ready for my day. We had the perfect spot — on top of a hill facing East-southeast. But until I retired I was hit and miss on taking the time to actually catch the sunrise.  And then, I didn’t always have a camera at the ready, so very few were ever captured.

Fast forward to my retirement years. I now have hundreds (maybe thousands) of pictures of sunrises and I am so glad I can share those with others who may not have the time or the perfect location to view these masterpieces of creation. While Facebook has its drawbacks, being able to share a sunrise photo instantly is definitely a plus.

Sunrise this time of year is @ 5:30 a.m.  Take time, make time!