One of the blog sites that I subscribe to is Exposing the Big Game. The blog does a fabulous job in exposing the terrible ‘game’ of people hunting animals for sport! Many of the topics that author Jim Robertson exposes are incredibly painful to read but, please, do drop across there and support his efforts.
All of which is a preamble to a short item that was posted last Sunday and is republished here today.
Nothing more to add to those rules than offer this photograph taken at home early one day last December, 2013.
Dearest Suzann, who invited me out to San Carlos, Mexico, for the Christmas of 2007, leading to Jean and me meeting, is heavily involved in rescuing the many feral dogs found in that part of the world.
She recently sent me the following:
Shepherd Boy will be euthanized in a few days at the CA state kennel he is at and Jeannie Wade is trying to help save his life….do you guys know of anyone? Let me know asap.
He is located in the Central Coast area of California and goes by the name ‘Shepherd Boy’ and is one year old.
He is in a high kill shelter and has days to live.
Shepherd Boy is shy and sweet tempered and the volunteers at the shelter feel he will make a very good companion/pet for a nice family or couple.
Paul, If I were up there, I would take him in a heartbeat!
Suzann
Please, please share this as far and wide as possible – urgently.
Shepherd Boy may be found at the Central Coast SPCA, Orcutt, California 93457
Suzann has given me the name of Jeannine Wade and she may be emailed at: centralcoastspca@yahoo.com
A reposting of a blog from Dog Leader Mysteries about a dog food recall.
Quickly stepping over the observation that today’s post is about as far removed, topic wise, from yesterday’s post as one could possibly imagine, nonetheless this is important and needs to be widely shared.
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Raw food recall: J J Fuds Frozen Pet Food
J. J. Fuds Raw dog food recall expands
Dear Fellow Dog Lover,
Because you signed up on my website and asked to be notified, I’m sending you this special recall alert.
On January 27, 2015, J. J. Fuds of Valparaiso, Indiana, announced it is expanding its recall of select lots of J. J. Fuds Raw Frozen Pet Food to include 2 other products due to unspecified contamination.
I copied this email notice from The Dog Food Advisor. I highly recommend you sign up for this list.
Please share to save dogs’ lives
We don’t feed Sydney raw meat. We do feed organic raw vegetables in limited quantities. We care about pets and want our readers to share this important news. Also we want you to know that we receive the Dog Food Advisor’s updates. Mike Sagman never stuffs our email box, but sends out notices as fast as he receives them. We asked our local pet stores if they receive notices before opening each day. You can do that. Ask when and how pet foods get pulled from their shelves, your pet’s life depends on this.
The history of power, control, those who wield it, and where it has taken us all.
There is a real pain in me as I start into today’s post. A pain that comes from agonising over whether or not to write in this vein. A pain that has its roots in me being forced to accept that global politics, money and power-plays are much worse than I ever wanted to believe.
What, you must be asking, has got me plunging so far into this dark place? When just twenty-four hours ago I was writing of peace, calm and deep meditation?
Simply a film!
A film that was uploaded by the BBC a few days ago exclusively on to their BBC iPlayer platform.
The film is called Bitter Lake and here’s the trailer.
The full film is 2 hours, 20 minutes long. (But note that the film is age-restricted for obvious reasons.)
I can’t encourage you to watch it. For if you do, the world may never seem the same to you.
But Jeannie and I did watch it and think it should be shared widely. And, yes, it has changed the world for us.
Here’s how it is described by Adam Curtis and the BBC.
Published on Jan 26, 2015
Shown exclusively on the BBC iPlayer service in the UK
This upload is for those outside of the UK
Politicians used to have the confidence to tell us stories that made sense of the chaos of world events.
But now there are no big stories and politicians react randomly to every new crisis – leaving us bewildered and disorientated.
And journalism – that used to tell a grand, unfurling narrative – now also just relays disjointed and often wildly contradictory fragments of information.
Events come and go like waves of a fever. We – and the journalists – live in a state of continual delirium, constantly waiting for the next news event to loom out of the fog – and then disappear again, unexplained.
And the formats – in news and documentaries – have become so rigid and repetitive that the audiences never really look at them.
In the face of this people retreat from journalism and politics. They turn away into their own worlds, and the stories they and their friends tell each other.
I think this is wrong, sad, and bad for democracy – because it means the politicians become more and more unaccountable.
I have made a film that tries to respond to this in two ways.
It tells a big story about why the stories we are told today have stopped making sense.
But it is also an experiment in a new way of reporting the world. To do this I’ve used techniques that you wouldn’t normally associate with TV journalism. My aim is to make something more emotional and involving – so it reconnects and feels more real.
BBC iPlayer has given me the opportunity to do this – because it isn’t restrained by the rigid formats and schedules of network television. It’s a place you can go to experiment and try out new ideas.
It is also liberating – both because things can be any length, and also because it allows the audience to watch the films in different ways.
The film is called Bitter Lake. It is a bit of an epic – it’s two hours twenty minutes long.
It tells a big historical narrative that interweaves America, Britain, Russia and Saudi Arabia. It shows how politicians in the west lost confidence – and began to simplify the stories they told. It explains why this happened – because they increasingly gave their power away to other forces, above all global finance.
But there is one other country at the center of the film.
Afghanistan.
This is because Afghanistan is the place that has repeatedly confronted politicians, as their power declines, with the terrible truth – that they cannot understand what is going on any longer. Let alone control it.
The film shows in detail how all the foreigners who went to Afghanistan created an almost totally fictional version of the country in their minds.
They couldn’t see the complex reality that was in front of them – because the stories they had been told about the world had become so simplified that they lacked the perceptual apparatus to see reality any longer.
And this blindness led to a terrible disaster – support for a blatantly undemocratic government, wholesale financial corruption and thousands of needless deaths.
A horrific scandal that we, in our disconnected bubble here in Britain, seem hardly aware of. And even if we are – it is dismissed as being just too complex to understand.
But it is important to try and understand what happened. And the way to do that is to try and tell a new kind of story. One that doesn’t deny the complexity and reduce it to a meaningless fable of good battling evil – but instead really tries to makes sense of it.
I have got hold of the unedited rushes of almost everything the BBC has ever shot in Afghanistan. It is thousands of hours – some of it is very dull, but large parts of it are extraordinary. Shots that record amazing moments, but also others that are touching, funny and sometimes very odd.
These complicated, fragmentary and emotional images evoke the chaos of real experience. And out of them I have tried to build a different and more emotional way of depicting what really happened in Afghanistan.
A counterpoint to the thin, narrow and increasingly destructive stories told by those in power today.
And I must include this comment from the relevant page on BBC Blogs:
Quite simply one of the best films I’ve ever watched. The theme and content made so many connections linking events of the last 40 years. It’s perhaps time to reflect on power ,control and those who wield it . The official narrative is not our narrative , we have a choice to decide what we believe . Time to reflect and make that choice.
Thanks for such an informing film.
In yesterday’s post, I wrote about using a biofeedback device promising to explain more today.
Also yesterday, I touched on the benefits of meditation and how the video from quantum physicist John Hagelin PhD seemed so interesting.
So let’s start with that sixteen-minute talk from John Hagelin.
In this intro video, quantum physicist and certified TM teacher John Hagelin, PhD explains the Transcendental Meditation technique and its benefits from a scientific perspective.
Now while I had been aware of transcendental meditation, seemingly for years, I had never really taken steps properly to understand exactly what it is all about. Clearly, John Hagelin does an excellent job in that video in giving one a good basic understanding of TM.
The picture is taken from the company’s website where, as one might expect, there are many glowing reports about its effectiveness. But the key benefit to my mind is that it is a, “FDA-cleared, non-drug, non-invasive hypertension treatment device”.
I purchased it, for $99 plus S&H, because I was aware of having an elevated blood pressure and it came recommended by long-term friend, Dan Gomez. I have been using it now for about 8 weeks.
Essentially, one clips an elasticated strap incorporating a strain gauge around one’s midriff, inserts the ear-pieces into the ears and settles back somewhere comfortable in a quiet room.
While my blood pressure is still too high, the unit most definitely has an incredible calming effect and in approximately twenty minutes my breathing rate drops from about ten breaths per minute (BPM) to five or even just below five BPM. The calming effect stays around for quite some time afterwards.
That why the item about deep breathing from Val Boyco referred to yesterday seemed so apt. No less apt that the comment left by blogger Raj.
Deep breathing exercise also insists on holding the deeply inhaled breath, and releasing it in gradual phases, with a pause between each release, till entire air is exhaled; followed by three to four cycles of same process… One of the purposes of this structured format is to keep the mind in the now and thereby relax the practitioner… Best wishes… Raj.
Not sure what else to add other than be very happy to answer any questions – assuming I know the answer!
In these modern times, when we are bombarded by so much from so many directions, the benefits of deep meditation, of slowing down so naturally, as our dogs demonstrate every single day, could be of tremendous value.
Just watch this short video of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, speaking at Lake Louise, Canada in 1968.
Uploaded on Apr 3, 2009
The Transcendental Meditation technique uses the natural tendency of the mind to go toward greater happiness, so the mind effortlessly transcends to its most silent state.
I’ve written before about how our breath is connected with our wellbeing and emotional state. Noticing how we are breathing is a tool that we can use to monitor how we are doing.
There is another pause that comes with our breath which is also revealing. The pause at the end of the exhale before we take in more air. When we are distracted, stressed or in an anxious state, there is no pause. We don’t trust we have enough air and we don’t allow ourself to relax and let go.
Just take a moment to tune into how you are breathing right now. Just notice without judgment.
Pausing at the end of an exhale can only happen when we are relaxed and in tune with our mind and body. When our body and mind are aligned in the present moment.
I then left a reply in the comments section:
Excellent advice. For the last few weeks I have been using a biofeedback unit that through guiding one to breathe in harmony with a musical phrase allows one to slow the whole body down. Down to about 4.8 breaths per minute. It really underlines how slow one’s breathing rate can be and, supporting your post, the glorious pauses after each inhale and exhale.
And offered to write a post about the unit and my experiences. (Coming out tomorrow.)
However, what I wanted to do as a ‘lead-in’ to that post was to discover if there was any research into the benefits, as in scientific benefits, of slowing one’s body down in this fashion. What is surely nothing more than a form of meditation. Where to start looking? Needn’t have worried; there were many items on YouTube that covered the benefits of meditation.
There was a video from the AsapSCIENCE guys Mitchell Moffit and Gregory Brown, but I found it too jazzy and irritating, rather ironically! Then there was one from physicist John Hagelin that seemed much more appropriate to my tastes (and that is featured tomorrow as well).
By now it was coming up to 4:30pm and I had a dozen other things to do, plus try and fit in a biofeedback session – I could feel the stress rising within me.
Then I dipped into Terry Hershey’s latest Sabbath Moment and, guess what! Here’s what I read:
Learning to let go
January 26, 2015
Some of us think holding on makes us strong, but sometimes it is letting go. Herman Hesse
Uncertainty is the only certainty there is, and knowing how to live with insecurity is the only security. John Allen Paulos
When you let go of trying to get more of what you don’t really need, it frees up oceans of energy to make a difference with what you have. Lynne Twist
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Today I am sitting in a café (and bar) in Vaison-la-Romaine, in the Provence region of France, nursing my espresso.
No, wait… that was last week.
It just sounds sexier than saying, “Today I’m looking out my window at a gloomy winter sky, here in the Pacific Northwest, with a Thesaurus in hand hoping for a gushing synonym for gray.”
Welcome home. Home for me is always awaited and valued, but still elicits a bout of scotoma (selective vision), where we end up comparing the life we have, for the “life we deserve” (the actual wording for a recent advertised e-course).
My favorite part of my recent France trip was visiting family run wineries, spending time with the owner / wine-maker, with the permission to linger, sensing a comfort grounded in story and connection. Said one (when we asked him about being a small winery–in a world where big is everything), “I am glad. I am not alone. I work with family.” (Referring to his son and three daughters.)
And it makes me wonder about this mental sleight of hand we use, thinking about the life we are destined for, as somehow different (or better) from the life we now we live.
There is a Tibetan story about an earnest young man seeking enlightenment. (Earnest people must think this quite unfair–since they play a central role in most parables and stories about enlightenment.)
A famous sage passes through the man’s village. The man asks the sage to teach him the art of meditation. The sage agrees. He tells the man, “Withdraw from the world. Mediate every day in the specific way I will teach you. Do not waver and you will attain enlightenment.”
The earnest man follows the sage’s instructions to the letter. Time passes — and no enlightenment. Two years, five, ten, twenty pass.
It happens that the sage once again passes through the man’s village. The man seeks him out, grumbling that despite his best intentions and devotion and diligent efforts, he does not achieve enlightenment. “Why?”
The sage asks, “What type of meditation did I teach you?”
The man tells him.
The sage says, “Oh, what a terrible mistake I made! That is not the right meditation for you. You should have done another kind altogether. Too bad, for now it is too late.”
Disconsolate, the man returns to his cave. Staking his life on the sage’s instructions, and now believing he is without hope, the man abandons all his wishes and efforts and need to control his road to enlightenment. He does not know what to do. So, he does what he knows best: he begins meditating. And in a short while, much to his astonishment, his confusion begins to dissolve, and his inner world comes to life. A weight falls away and he feels lighter, and regenerated. When he walks out of the cave, the sky is bluer, the snow capped mountains whiter, and the world around him more vivid.
There is no doubt that all too often, our efforts–to succeed or achieve or attain–get in the way of our living. It brings to mind my favorite Robert Capon quote, “We live life like ill-taught piano students. So inculcated with the flub that will get us in dutch, we don’t hear the music, we only play the right notes.”
I understand. I was weaned on a spirituality that predicated itself on artifice. In other words, the importance is placed upon appearance, rather that just being. (It was vital to “look spiritual.” Which begs the question, “What do spiritual people look like?” As a boy, I always thought the “spiritual people” looked as if some part of their clothing was a size too small.)
What is it we are holding on to–so rigid, so firm, white-knuckled in our determination?
At some point, we’ve got to breathe.
Just breathe.
Without realizing it (and after the sage’s disheartening news), the man in the story “let go.”
He let go of the need to see life as a problem to be solved. He let go of the need to have the correct answers (or experiences) for his “enlightenment.” He let go of the need to see his spiritual life in terms of a formula. He let go of the restraints that come from public opinion.
Abandon your masterpiece, sink into the real masterpiece. Leonard Cohen
Without realizing it, he took Leonard Cohen’s advice. He abandoned his “masterpiece”–the perception of what he needed to accomplish, or how he needed to appear, or what he needed to feel–in order to allow himself to sink down into this life, this moment, even with all of its uncertainty and insecurity.
For the first many years, meditation or prayer was a requirement or compulsion. In his emptiness, meditation and prayer was an offering of thanks, freely given, and without constraint. True spiritual enlightenment, it seems, happens when you are not trying to impress anyone, or score any points with heavenly bookkeepers.
It sounds easy doesn’t it? But here’s the deal: My best intentions to play the right notes can fabricate an armor that keeps me from the vividness of life–whether it be to pray or meditate or notice or give or mourn or dance or play or grieve or laugh or celebrate or love… or just to walk.
I never did find a good enough synonym for the gray (although I’ll keep looking). Gladly, the sun has broken through. And there is enough warmth to persuade us that spring may arrive tomorrow. Daffodil shoots everywhere–up through the leaves and debris–help the ruse. So it’s garden time this afternoon, turning manure into the vegetable garden beds, beginning to cut back and clean some of the perennial beds. Enough work for the back to call a time out and request reprieve. I’m headed to the swing under the maple, when I look up to see the sun illuminating the red-twig dogwood shrubs, 10 foot canes glowing, a bright cranberry red. It catches my breath. And I am glad to be alive.
People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive… of the rapture of being alive. Joseph Campbell
Such power in those words. Then how moments later what I had read from Terry made so much sense to me. So perfectly connected with yesterday’s post Animals make us human. So relevant that quotation yesterday about animal happiness. This one:
Neuroscience key to animal happiness
“…research in neuroscience has been showing that emotions drive behavior, and my thirty-five years of experience working with animals have shown me that this is true. Emotions come first. You have to go back to the brain to understand animal welfare.”
Animals Make Us Human : Creating the best life for Animals
by Temple Grandin & Catherine Johnson
Such a close parallel with that well-known saying about us humans: ‘we are what we think‘. How our own happiness, just as it is with our animals, has its roots in our emotions.
How letting go, how staying in the present, is so good for us. How dogs do that so perfectly.
How we humans have so much to learn from our dogs.
Pure, deep peace radiating out from Hazel’s loving eyes.
As I have mentioned in the past and undoubtedly will do so again in the future, one of the most wonderful aspects of this world of blogging is the way that connections are made. Just a few weeks ago, a connection was made between Learning from Dogs and Dog Leader Mysteries. DLM’s byline is: Saving dogs’ lives and dog lovers’ sanity. Dog Leader Mysteries is written by author Deborah Taylor-French.
Anyway, out of the exchanges that have taken place between Deborah and myself, came a reference to a post about animal happiness that was published on Deborah’s blog in October, 2013. It is very interesting and I am delighted to be given permission to share it with you.
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Neuroscience key to animal happiness
“…research in neuroscience has been showing that emotions drive behavior, and my thirty-five years of experience working with animals have shown me that this is true. Emotions come first. You have to go back to the brain to understand animal welfare.”
Animals Make Us Human : Creating the best life for Animals
by Temple Grandin & Catherine Johnson
Water dogs having a blast in Spring Lake Park.
By Deborah Taylor-French
Those of us who live and/or work with animals know…
animals have emotions.
Temple Grandin has made the understanding, care and handling of farm animals her life’s work. I refer to her book Animals Make Us Human because not only has she studied farm animals, but she also loves and lives with pets. In her books, especial this one, she insists that we must understand how animals brains work, how they see, hear and smell every sensory detail in their surroundings.
Animals emotions drive their behavior.
To make a better life for our pets, for domestic and wild animals we must understand the main emotions that drive behavior. This will help us to turn on their positive emotions and avoid turning on FEAR, RAGE and GRIEF.
Example: Rabbits and horses are prey animals.
Never chase either rabbits or horses.
Teach your pet rabbit or horse to come to you.
Always reward them for recognizing their name and coming when called.
When you chase a prey animal, you make him or her fearful of you!
Emotions are the gifts of our ancestors. We have them and so do other animals. We must never forget this. When it comes to animal welfare we can always do better. Most of the time “good welfare” is not “good enough.”
The Emotional Lives of Animals by Marc Bekoff.
Dogs Depend on us for freedom from fear and safety
Never tie up your dog unless it is in your company in a human training session.
A dog needs to feel he can flee to safety.
Be sensitive to your dog’s fear signals and show him you will protect and calm him.
Increase your dogs positive emotions by interesting, but not overstimulating activities.
Always stop training before your dog gets tired.
Dogs are the only animals that live with us inside of their flight zone.
Dogs depend on us for positive and playful lives
When you help increase an animal’s curiosity, you turn on his or her positive emotions of SEEKING and PLAY.
Example: Dogs love to play.
Find a time and place when both you and your dog seem relaxed.
Invite your dog to play by doing a play bow or picking up his favorite toy.
Use an excited and happy tone of voice to call your dog.
Run away.
When your dog chases you, stop.
Wait for your dog to run then chase.
Always stop before your dog seems fearful or overexcited.
Dogs love this game, which dog lovers know dogs play every chance they get.
Winter wonderland four, the last of the series. (One was here, two was here, and three was here.)
Background information is after the last photograph.
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These animals were photographed just north of the Barber Lake on a highway near Mine Center, Ontario, Canada. The odds of seeing an albino moose are astronomically rare; let alone seeing two of them. It really doesn’t matter the colour of their fur; white or dark brown.
Once in a while there is an opportunity to take in a piece of nature that most of us may never see ‘in the wild’.
A huge thank you to Dordie for forwarding all the pictures featured over the last four weeks.
I noticed the other day a series of photographs of the moon and Venus that were included in an item on EarthSky News. All I am going to do is to republish a selection of the photographs so if you would like to read the full item, including all the photographs, then here is the link.
Mohamed Laaïfat Photographies in Normandy, France caught the little planet Mercury, too, along with the moon and Venus, on January 21.
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João Pedro Marques caught bright Venus and the waxing moon on the evening of January 22, 2015, from Portugal. The reddish “star” above and to the left of the moon is Mars.
In the above image, Mars may only be seen by viewing a bigger image here.
One Horse Media in Lolo, Montana wrote: “What a cool moon and view of Venus this evening! I was happy to have just enough time to take a few photos as soon as I got home!”
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Hecktor Barrios in Hermosillo, Mexico wrote: “Venus, Moon and Mercury, the latter barely visible.”
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Planet Venus and young moon on January 21, 2015, as captured by Cathy Emmett Palmer in Panama City Beach, Florida.
Won’t add any more thoughts from me because each and every one of you will have your own feelings and responses to these photographs. Don’t want my ideas to get in the way of your own thoughts.
Just all of you have a wonderful and peaceful weekend.
Trying to make sense of our place in the world – and probably failing!
Yesterday’s post, Making sense of who we are?, was built upon a recent essay from George Monbiot: A Small and Shuffling Life. It is a terrific essay, in the very best tradition of George Monbiot. I really hope you read it in yesterday’s post because today’s introspective jaunt is built on that essay. Two particular paragraphs of his essay really ‘spoke’ to me.
The opening paragraph:
Live free or die: this is the maxim of our age. But the freedoms we celebrate are particular and limited. We fetishise the freedom of business from state control; the freedom not to pay taxes; the freedom to carry guns and speak our minds and worship whom we will. But despite – in some cases because of – this respect for particular freedoms, every day the scope of our lives appears to contract.
Later:
We carry with us the psychological equipment, rich in instinct and emotion, required to navigate that world. But our survival in the modern economy requires the use of few of the mental and physical capacities we possess. Sometimes it feels like a small and shuffling life. Our humdrum, humiliating lives leave us, I believe, ecologically bored.
In that second paragraph I sense something from Mr. Monbiot that is felt by me and Jean and appears to be shared very widely. A sense that something about today’s society is broken. That the last, say fifty years, of increasing living standards, health and prosperity, albeit not universally embraced, have brought us no closer to a golden future. That, as so clearly voiced in the preceding paragraph, “… our survival in the modern economy requires the use of few of the mental and physical capacities we possess.”
My guess is that George Monbiot and Terry Hershey have never met. One might suggest that their backgrounds are as different as two people might be. Take their respective ‘About’ pages on their blogsites. Here are their closing paragraphs.
First, George:
My work is more sedentary than it used to be, so I temper it with plenty of physical activity: sea kayaking, ultimate frisbee, running and some heavy duty gardening: growing my own vegetables and much of my own fruit.
Here are some of the things I love: my family and friends, salt marshes, arguments, chalk streams, Russian literature, kayaking among dolphins, diversity of all kinds, rockpools, heritage apples, woods, fishing, swimming in the sea, gazpacho, ponds and ditches, growing vegetables, insects, pruning, forgotten corners, fossils, goldfinches, etymology, Bill Hicks, ruins, Shakespeare, landscape history, palaeoecology, Gavin and Stacey and Father Ted.
Here are some of the things I try to fight: undemocratic power, corruption, deception of the public, environmental destruction, injustice, inequality and the misallocation of resources, waste, denial, the libertarianism which grants freedom to the powerful at the expense of the powerless, undisclosed interests, complacency.
Here is what I fear: other people’s cowardice.
I still see my life as a slightly unhinged adventure whose perpetuation is something of a mystery. I have no idea where it will take me, and no ambitions other than to keep doing what I do. So far it’s been gripping.
Now, Terry:
I used to ask of myself and others: what have you accomplished? Where are your credentials? What does your job and your bank account say about who you are?
Now, my questions are different: Are there butterflies in your garden? What are the color of loved ones’ eyes, when they are looking at you with hope? And when was the last time your house smelled of paper-white narcissus? Do sunsets make you smile? When was the last time you stood in stocking feet just to stare at the rising moon? Have you ever seen a sunflower bloom? Does the laughter of children do your heart good? At what angle does the sun enter your house?
Do I understand that life is full of complications, obligations and distractions? Yes. I do. My wife and I raise a teenage son. We run two businesses. So, yes, I know a bit about down-to-earth realities.
But this, too, is reality:
I love to watch the hummingbirds dance. I love that my son likes to put on his dancing shoes. I love to join him when we play old-time rock and roll. I love to stretch out on a garden bench on a warm summer day. I love a hot shower and drying with an expensive, oversized cotton towel. I love books, delight in poetry, and find sustenance in writing. I treasure the certainty that grace gives us all many second chances. I value the times I can simplify life by letting go of my need to validate my humanity through productivity. And I love to lose track of time in a garden.
I also know that sharing this with you – offering my practices for pausing, resources for doing less and living more, reflections in my blog —feeds me.
So I invite you, too, to join us — and together we’ll share, remind, and support each other, to “do less, live more.”
Yet, despite the differences in backgrounds, cultures and much more, to me there is a common openness, an honesty shared, and a passion for the truth.
All of which is a very long introduction to this week’s Sabbath Moment from Terry; republished in full.
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Finding sanctuary and grace
January 19, 2015
Today I am sitting in a café (and bar) in Vaison-la-Romaine, in the Provence region of France, nursing my espresso. The old men of the village (actually all of them are about my age) gather. They unload, swap stories, sip pastis, and watch petanque on TV. Some read the newspaper–with stories about Charlie Hebdo and photos of “Somme Nous Charlie“–carrying reminders of hope in our fragile and broken world.
I am glad to be here. Today. In this place. There is an air of familiarity among the men, and comfort in their ritual. I am grateful for reminders and invitations to live well into a place. Not just a physical space, but a tonic and sanctuary to the spirit. The invitation is a permission to settle down. (In the words of Jesus, “to come away and rest awhile.”) A sanctuary is a place that restores us, replenishes us, nourishes us. In this renewal, we are reminded, once again, of what really is important.
I agree that it is easy to sentimentalize. But living into the moment doesn’t smooth the edges of our life. It allows us to pay attention. I like to think that we can name the edges, to welcome and invite them into the sanctuary.
Outside a bicycle club gathers in the village center parking lot, ready for their weekend excursion. Their spirit is eager, their uniform bearing homage to their journey to the top of Mont Ventoux.
Sitting in the café, my thoughts meander, with no agenda or responsibilities to tether them. So I let them wander, a gift to embrace. But my reverie is interrupted with worry … I need a Sabbath Moment. And I don’t have a clue (I tell myself). It’s not easy on vacation. Especially without wi-fi.
I am on my annual trip to Europe with my good friend Bill McNabb to taste wine. He’s a wine writer (and pastor) in the San Francisco area. But mostly, he’s a friend. I’m his aide-de-camp and connoisseur.
We travel to wine regions and are blessed to taste beverages that we cannot afford, but offer us a glimpse of heaven.
Yes I’m biased. But then wine is not a beverage here; it is an experience. Your choice is to savor and take delight.
We visited wineries harvesting grapes from vines 100 years old. These are businesses passed down through the generations, grandfather to father to son (and now thankfully, often to daughter). A world where terroir is king, the personality of the soil. Meaning that this wine is born of a place, a very specific place. Here in the Rhone Valley, I’m honored to be in the company of crafts people. Like being with a great gardener. The men and women I met coddle their vines–they call them trees–lovingly.
Unlike Peter Mayle, I don’t have “A Year in Provence.” I only have a few days. But that’ll do… It is my first visit and I’m sure won’t be my last.
We’re in our gite–a rural rental property in France–we relish the evening light, a layer of bruised purple (pourple) above the slopes in Provence (Cotes du Rhone). Below the hills, vineyards roll through the landscape, the vines–still in winter and pruned–pose as menorah renderings in the dusk light.
Yes, this scene is a tonic. There is something about these moments that carry significance, because they are reminders, and they are sacraments. Partial, yes, but containing the full sustenance of grace.
And I think of the question a friend asks me, “What holds you?”
In other words… What sustains you, and carries you gently through your days?
Ryoken, a Zen master, lived the simplest kind of life in a little hut at the foot of a mountain. One evening a thief visited the hut, only to discover there was nothing in it to steal. Ryoken returned and caught him in the act.
“You may have come a long way to visit me,” he told the disillusioned prowler, “and you should not return empty-handed. Please take my clothes as a gift.”
The thief was bewildered. But he took the clothes and slunk away.
Ryoken sat naked, watching the moon, “Poor fellow,” he mused. “I wish I could have given him this beautiful moon.”
Sometimes I feel like that thief. Standing–in my own home, or in front of an audience, or in a crowd, or all alone–I am looking for something, for whatever ails me or creates a hole or emptiness; but, like that thief, not finding it. “What am I missing?” I ask myself. What am I wanting, yearning for, that I find myself in such a pell-mell-hurry or weighted down… hoping to fix it, or find it, or mend it. So I run and race and call on God, or the sky, or roll the dice with some prayer from my childhood. This will solve it, I tell myself. But the more I push, the more I ask, the more I beseech, the further I move from the center.
Here’s the deal: In my state of distraction, I cannot see that the core of my identity, the place where I stand in this moment (even at times without clarity, or stability, or faith, or answers)… I stand smack dab in the center of an awesome and illogical grace. Smack dab in the center of the sacred present.
If I do have the permission to see that place, I know that I am grounded. I am now able to breathe in and out, and rest in this acceptance.
Last night, above the slopes to the south, a slivered crescent moon rests, the sky a cobalt blue canvas. It is visceral, arresting, piercing. And for whatever reason, reassuring. This snapshot is imprinted, and I know in my heart that it is in some way essential, indispensable. I accept this gift of the moon, even though I don’t yet know why.
I don’t know what to tell you to do, exactly. Only that I too, wish I could give you the gift of that crescent moon.
I know this for certain: when we do not pay tribute, we are like the thief in the Zen story–without even knowing it–and we settle for less. So much less. So it is not just a question of what hold us, but of what holds us back… from being wholehearted, true to our self, fully alive, unafraid of uncertainty, and grateful for the gift of this moment.
Lord knows we look for ways to bottle it and sell it, when I reckon we should just get out of the way.
Our gite sits squarely in a vineyard and a working farm. A perfect setting to replenish. For years I’ve been writing about sanctuary and the need for restoration. And I’m my own worst enemy. There’s not a week that goes by that a Sabbath Moment friend doesn’t remind me to follow my own advice to pause… and let my soul catch up with my body. Gladly, this week I did.
ooOOoo
My penultimate reflection to today’s post is with a short, six-minute video from Professor Dan Gilbert. The video is entitled: The psychology of your future self. I hope you see it as offering a calming perspective to two days of inner psychological ramblings!
Published on Jun 3, 2014
“Human beings are works in progress that mistakenly think they’re finished.” Dan Gilbert shares recent research on a phenomenon he calls the “end of history illusion,” where we somehow imagine that the person we are right now is the person we’ll be for the rest of time. Hint: that’s not the case.
My final reflection is the lesson that dogs teach us; that one about living in the present.
