This poem follows on the heels of yesterday’s prayer. It dogged me with the tenacity of Heaven’s Hound until this was born. Ponder with me.
christianity
A Prayer For Today
May you be cast in full light today
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Grounding Practice
Practice for Releasing Unwanted Energy
If you are a person who often sees more than you want to see, or who accrues unwanted, negative energy flung far and wide by others, you may find this spiritual practice helpful.
- Take whatever position enables you to focus; I lie on my back with one hand on my abdomen and the other on my heart.
- Find a rhythm to your breathing, breathing in peace and exhaling anxiety.
- Now do a scan of your body and aura to find and root out all negative, unwanted energy which has lodged itself and affected your quality of life. There is no need to analyze or name the energies; no doubt you have already done that too much, only creating more unwanted energy.
- Start with your brain, imagining that you are going in with your hands and manually untangling the unwanted energy. It might be like removing seaweed and barnacles from a fishing net. As you seek and release, focus your attention by saying, “Untangling, releasing, untangling, releasing.” Breathe in peace and exhale negative energy.
- With each piece of negative energy released, send it back down to the earth where it can be neutralized. I imagine a channel extending from my sacral bone into the earth. Send the energy down while saying, “Releasing, sending, releasing, sending.” Send it down with a great big “Woosh” of breath.
- Continue scanning your body and aura, finding those places where unwanted energy likes to hide out. When you reach a place of balanced integrity, you are grounded.
- Follow up with a cleansing ritual such as spritzing with water, or burning sage or incense.
May peaceful moments come and stay.
Rita
Photo Credit: Donna Coburn http://www.artrage.com
Listen For The Breath Of The Divine
The wall between us and the divine is very thin at this time of year. It permeates every nook and cranny of our existence. If we are awake, we can hear its breath whisper words of love through chinks we have burrowed in the doors to our souls. Keep on knocking.
Rilke’s Book of Hours
Anita Barrows
1,6
You, God, who live next door—
If at times, through the long night,
I trouble you with my urgent knocking—
this is why: I hear you breathe so seldom.
I know you’re all alone in that room.
If you should be thirsty, there’s no one to get you a glass of water.
I wait listening, always.
Just give me a sign! I’m right here.
As it happens, the wall between us is very thin.
Why couldn’t a cry from one of us break it down?
It would crumble easily, it would barely make a sound.
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A Timely Mandate: Play Your Heart Out
We are called to play one another
into being
with the instrument we’ve been given.
RHK
Photo Credit:
“SoulCards” by Deborah Koff-Chapin. The technique Deborah has created is called “touch drawing.” The cards come in two decks of 60 images and can be used alone or with others as reflection tools. They have enriched my meditation for years and have helped those I companion with. www.soulcards.com
Used with permission from the artist
The Holy Howl
My brother died last April and in May my sister and I received an unexpected invitation from his neighbor to accompany him to Wolf Haven. The unspoken intent was to pay tribute to George. This poem emerged from my longing for connection. I often encounter those who have passed in various ways. This was by far the most powerful.
The Holy Howl
(for Martha)
On May eighteenth
before spring had taken hold,
we encountered the freshly transitioned spirit of our brother
in the haunting howl of twelve wolves
at Wolf Haven Sanctuary.
Once abused, abandoned or old,
now they pace, paw and hunt safely with a new pack.
George had loved these wolves
because they were the ancestors
of his beloved Siberian Husky Zane.
A self-designated member of Zane’s pack,
George would wrestle on the floor with Zane
and howl “JingleBells” in unison with the Husky.
We came to Wolf Haven to honor our brother.
We ambled in a tight circle
pausing at each of the six enclosures
to meet the pacing pair that called it home
and to hear the story of their journey to Wolf Haven.
Arriving back at the entrance we stopped
to listen to the guide’s closing remarks.
Eerily silent throughout the tour, now
a lone wolf lifted its head and let lose
a magnificent primal howl,
stopping the guide in mid-sentence.
An expectant silence ensued,
shattered soon by a raucous chorus
as the whole pack joined in.
They split the mythical veil
that separates here from hereafter.
We met our brother in the holy howl.
Rest in peace, George.
© Rita H Kowats 9-23-19
Wolf Photo Credit: pexels.com Continue reading
“Sleepless in Seattle”: Navigating an Ego Storm
Spirit-Weaving
A web of webs
connects bar to bar
on the lanai railing,
its silver threads catching
the subdued September sun
as it inches its way across the eastern sky.
Early autumn wind cools
the coffee hoarded in my hands-
a comforting respite from the nocturnal
ego storm that ensnared insectile what ifs
in the web of my soul, exhausting me
with their raging
against the storm.
Now
out here in healing sun,
wind and real webs
a Spirit-Web of trust
has neutralized the what-ifs,
calling me back to rest
in the center of my own best self.
Steady
Ready.
© Rita H Kowats 9-9-19
Oh, America
Before we escape into more analysis…This time let us…
sit in silence together
feel it to the depths
until we know,
really know,
the place to which we have come.
Then let us stand together and act.
Old Soul, Old Body: Meanderings
I never know what I will find at the beach
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RENEWAL
This post goes back a few years. I was reminded of it now while much of the world is burning up from forest fires. The earth does renew herself, as witnessed in the terrain of Mt. St. Helens in Washington state, USA. If we renew our souls as faithfully as nature renews herself, there is hope for us.
In an effort to protect our egos, we leave in our wake a destructive landscape of regret. Our acts of protection are as much an animal response as protecting their physical lives is for other animals. The difference, of course, is that we can strengthen our egos sufficiently to withstand attacks and move beyond them for the sake of the common good. The process of moving beyond ego creates a soul-landscape rich in variety. Remnants of ego caught on jagged crags, conjure memories of lies to self and others; charred skeletons of timber stand in witness to courageous suffering endured, and hopeless suffering self-inflected.
Our soul’s geography resembles the terrain of active volcanoes years after they have exploded. Destructive lava flow has given way to affluent bursts of bold, bright, wildflowers- the acts of justice and compassion sown as seeds alongside germs of ego. Patches of green miraculously inch their way through the bowl of impenetrable metamorphic rock.
Just as rock can be intrinsically altered by the flow of hot lava, so is the soul dramatically altered by the movement of the Spirit, and our response to her. If we trust the Spirit, and trust ourselves to grapple with our instinct to protect our egos, seedlings will dot the horizon. Wildflowers, once extirpated by fear, will burst forth like fireworks on Independence Day.
I recommend frequent road trips through the terrain of our souls.
