Love

Is it possible for the rose to say, "I will give my fragrance to the good people who smell me, but I will withhold it from the bad?"

Or is it possible for the lamp to say, "I will give my light to the good people in this room, but I will withhold it from the evil people"?

Or can a tree say, "I'll give my shade to the good people who rest under me, but I will withhold it from the bad"?

These are images of what Love is about.


[One Minute Wisdom by Anthony De Mello]

I miss her!

Mi.... I miss her!

Leaving Behind

For me the hard part comes in leaving what has been behind.
I know that does make sense.
Humans strive to create; whether it's buildings, relationships, communities, ideas, books, paintings, arts, music or whatever.

In leaving a place, group of peoples or community behind, I inevitably leave the foundations of my creative efforts incomplete.

What's more, my need for connection was intertwined with what I've created in that place and being in a new place leaves an empty space, as yet devoid of my creative endeavours!

It is that emptiness which is my struggle; with what and with whom do I fill it with?
How do I go forth afresh, courageously and with no hint of grief, when the very process of starting again is inevitably one that involves cutting myself off from what was?

I don't know the answers but I suppose it is by coming to see the emptiness as a blank canvas, one which I will fill with a beautiful drawing or painting!

In North London, I don't have a blank canvas and I'm glad of that.
I have the beginnings of an artwork formed by a few ties of my life so far.
I'm creating connections with the buildings, communities, ideas and most importantly, with the people around me.
Using the ties of what is present at hand and the hope of what will come, I'll try to fill my 'North London-canvas' with life, love and happiness.

Did you already know...?!!?!!??!!

When I made a choice to take this path on my journey...
... did you know this is where I would be coming to?
is this where I would be stopping
and learning to say 'No'
Standing up for myself
Learning about protecting myself
Learning about healthy boundaries
Learning...
that by saying 'no',
there is a price to be paid

Did you already know I would be here?
Did you already know this is exactly where I will  be?
Did you already know exactly I would be here?

Be gentle with me
Be generous with me
Be gracious with me
... for I am broken, fragile, frail  and vulnerable!

I have been here before
... this junction/crossroad of my journey
Yet, each time it's different
It's another deeper layer of the same
Like the seasons in a year
Yet, each year the seasons can be very different from the year/years before

Here I am today
... admitting
... claiming
... looking in the eye
... embracing and
... befriending
my brokenness, fragility, frailty and vulnerability

Here I am

Just as I am

I am

... continuing my journey
Coming to myself
Hopefully closer 'home' to myself
To say clearly... loudly... and courageously
with ownership
"I am broken,fragile, frail and vulnerable."

Even saying these few truthful authentic words
... seems to sit more comfortable
Sitting side by side... looking at each other
... hugging each other sideways
... smiling, with our heads on each other's

and ...

... saying ...

It's alright.
It's okay.

Did you already know from here on...
... where I would be going onto next?

Freedom

Today, as I looked back at one of  my journal written on a Silent Retreat last year at St. Beuno's Jesuit Spiritual Center in Wales how I was then still searching for 'this' freedom I long for which I am still searching for even now.
Makes me wonder if I will ever find it?
Yet, somewhere along my longing and search is continually bringing me another step closer to myself and my heart.
In that alone, I can rest in peace knowing I am flying without wings and IT'S ALRIGHT!


"Grant me the freedom to trust You, to be, to love, to live, to give, to receive, to accept what I cannot understand, to embrace the pains of my life, to embrace the difficulties-struggles-sorrows of my life-the anxieties of the unknown, the not knowing what my next step or chapter in life is going to take me; to have the acceptance-clarity of not knowing and IT'S ALRIGHT.

Grant me Your freedom, Your clarity
Set me free to be the person you have made and created me to my fullest potential and capacity.

Grant that I know this deep in my innermost being
As you have called me to be"

"For the rest of my days,
I will embrace myself, loved in Your heart, Your being in one with me
Called by my name
You have summoned me
To freedom of being
To trust in Your unfailing love - unconditional love everlasting
To embrace life at it's fullest
To honor and respect each of your created being just as You love them
To drink of Your grace, kindness, love, spirit, goodness, gentleness
To savour You
To bask inYour love, goodness, tenderness
To be engulf by your burning light - fire - desires and passion that I may be set ablaze, too
To soak in Your great pool of love, mercies & grace
All this I pray and surrender"

[15 June, 2012. Journal Book 6]

Love After Love

The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

 

~Derek Walcott~

 

 

Opening myself up

Since leaving art college some twenty three years ago, I've not really continued to draw actively.
Yes, of course... I've doodled here and there but I didn't take myself seriously.

Through the years, I've always desired to get back into drawing or painting yet somehow that desire seemed to fade as the years went by.
I somehow felt ... I was missing something important and beautiful in my life.
I wasn't challenging myself to create on paper or canvas, to capture what was happening in my head.
Those images, stories and experiences I was living.

But of course, these were only happening in my head! and why should that mean that it is not real at all?
Of course it was as real as I know them to be.

Yet, something inside me had 'shut down' terribly!!! and I just could not bring myself to draw.
I could not let myself 'go', 'be open', 'set myself free' to create anymore.
My need to be 'perfect' and 'not to make any mistakes' was tearing me down.
Was I created to ' tear & shut myself down'?
The answer was 'NO'.
So clearly, something had to be done.
But.... how, what or why?

In 2008, I began very consciously and very slowly ... bringing myself back into the arts of creativity, drawing and painting.

The question of "Who am i?" (truly really honestly without all those masks I wear every moment) has been bringing me to a much fuller richer life of self discovery.
My next question of  "What then gives me life?" (all those pleasures and joys which life offers) has set me along this fun-fulfilling journey.

Here is one of my very first paintings:

"You have to create what excites you, what you're passionate about. As soon as you create with the idea of 'will everybody like this?', you dilute everything unique and special about what you do. If you make it with passion, someone else will connect to it with passion. And you only need one other person to love it enough - Sonia King

Contemplating Nature

A flower, a plant growing out of season is something I've always been drawn to. Anything out of the norm for that matter.
Because it stands alone, it calls forth in me a stance of contemplative presence. My eyes would not have caught it had it been a part of a community of flowers, plants or trees.
My simple holding of the object of my delight gives it meaning & brings it to a new birth. It is a healing thought that I gave some kind of completion to that flower, plant or tree simply by noticing it.
I've often gazed, admired, appreciated or savoured that solitary flower, plant or tree simply because they stood alone. It is absolutely beautiful in it's solitariness. Something ordinary then becomes extraordinary somehow precisely because it stands alone.
In the forest of trees it would be just another tree, but standing there against the grain of fields, it becomes a companion on my journey.

I pray for the courage to stand alone at times, to withdraw from the crowd that I may carry back to the community the new strength & new vision received in solitude.

Transformation 3

Rest

Transformation 2

Raging Explosion

Rainbow of Life

Surrendering

Hope