Now Reading: By The River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept

It's a grey and misty day where I am. 

I got up this morning, had breakfast and sat outside. 

Birds flew ..and chirped. beautiful birds. ..and I'm surrounded by trees. 

I sat and I read. ...tranquil. in the earth scented breeze. 

Saturday, December 4, 1993

You Have To take risks, he said. We will only understand the miracle of life fully when we allow the unexpected to happen. 

Every day, God gives us the sun--and also one moment in which we have the ability to change everything that makes us unhappy. Every day, we try to pretend that we haven't perceived that moment, that it doesn't exist---that today is the same as yesterday and will be the same as tomorrow. But if people really pay attention to their everyday lives, they will discover that magic moment. It may arrive in the instant when we are doing something mundane, like putting our front door key in the lock; it may lie hidden in the quiet that follows the lunch hour or in the thousand and one things that all seem the same to us. But that moment exists---a moment when all the power of the stars becomes a part of us and enables us to perform miracles. 

Joy is sometimes a blessing, but it is often a conquest.Our magic moment helps us to change and sends us off in search of our dreams. Yes, we are going to suffer, we will have difficult times, and we will experience many disappointments---but all of this is transitory; it leaves no permanent mark. And one day we will look back with pride and faith at the journey we have taken. 

   Pitiful is the person who is afraid of taking risks. Perhaps this person will never be disappointed or disillusioned; perhaps she won't suffer the way people do when they have a dream to follow. But when that person looks back---and at some point everyone looks back---she will hear her heart saying, "What have you done with the miracles that God planted in your days? What have you done with the talents God bestowed on you? You buried yourself in a cave because you were fearful of losing those talents. So this is your heritage: the certainty that you wasted your life."

Pitiful are the people who realize this. Because when they are finally able to believe in miracles, their life's magic moments will have already passed them by. 

-xx

My Fave Things | Cosmopolitan Girls

One of my most favorite things has to be "Cosmopolitan Girls" by Charlotte Burley and Lyah Beth Leflore.

This novel has a unique way of lifting my spirits when I'm feeling a bit crappy. It's, at some point, sad - but for the most part, fun! & empowering. Its about two women who meet randomly at a bar after having not so good days. After sharing their stories over cosmos, they begin a friendship that anyone would want to be apart of. & it takes place in NYC :) 

I've given this book to many of my friends and everyone loves it. 

So I'm sharing it with you - because it really is a great read. 

& sometimes we need a little sisterly love. 

..which this is, in written form. 

-xx

Brain Food | The Heart Aroused : The Path Begins

I bought this book, after work today, titled "The Heart Aroused" by David Whyte.

I'm a mush in every sense of the word so I broke cardinal rule #1 and totally purchased it based on it's cover alone. It was the title that reeled me in. ...Then I looked down, saw 'poetry' and BAM. I'm sold. 

But see, I've yet to lose with this one. 

I'm only a few pages in and it's already proven to be very insightful. ..So much so that my kind soul thought it'd be cool to share the wealth. ..Of course with hopes that you too will find your lil thumper handsomely aroused. ;)

Chapter 1: The Path Begins

As we begin to think about our aloneness, where we fit in the world, why we are working where we are, the state of our soul and the direction we are headed, we join a long lineage of men and women who gave themselves over to the imagery of the poetic imagination to find out the selfsame thing. We begin to give those images life by speaking them aloud, however hesitantly. Questioning in a real way, we start, by all the lights of the poetic tradition, to awaken. ... But as we awaken, we take the first steps into the hall of grief and loss. Looking over the centuries of human struggle commemorated in poetry, a man or woman often seems to begin the journey to soul recovery in this very lonely place of self-assessment. The uninitiated might call it depression. 

When all things we want beyond our reach move slowly within our reach, it is easy to feel good about life. But if our sense of well-being becomes dependent on the constant delivery of goods to our door, we experience a sense of loss when the supply suddenly dries up, or we no longer perceive it has the same value. At this point we are thrown back on ourselves and must live on what we find there. In a way we are finally forced to rely on the one thing already within the compass of our grasp---our soul's natural entanglement in the world. This entanglement is often perceived for the first time through a sense of loss. It is as if we first stumble into our belonging by realizing how desperately out of place we feel. This sense of loss has a natural way of drawing us inside ourself. We might at first label the body's simple need to focus inward depression. But as we practice going inward, we come to realize that much of it is not depression in the least; it is a cry for something else, often the physical body's simple need for rest, for contemplation, and for a kind of forgotten courage, one difficult to hear demanding ... another life. 

It seems that to find the real path we have to go off the path we are on now, even for an instant, and earn the privilege of losing our way. As the path fades, we are forced to take a good look at the life in which we actually find ourselves. 

**************

Through this excerpt, I garnered an understanding for where I currently stand in life. It speaks about loss and in many ways I find myself losing. ..However, victoriously. < Interesting.

But there's no parade. No floats. Balloons. or Face Painting. 

& to few I divulge. 

Instead I find myself writing. Mentally, more than anything because for some reason I can't figure out a way to give life to a real pen. Thoughts enter my head so fast that it becomes difficult to make sense of them all [when I try to physically make notes of them - so I don't]. I think. I think. & I read. I write poetry. & with all that's going on up there ...I find myself wanting more out of those that I surround myself with. ..Yes. I am going through a self-assessment phase and yes that includes taking inventory. & Yes. that does mean that I find myself unsatisfied with certain stock. ..& Yes. for the longest I have held certain stock for the sake of holding it because Yes. the thought of packing it up and sending it on made me feel horrible [I felt mean] but *knock knock* I've come to find that when others get karate savvy ..it's 'no chairs spared'. 

[see: Jay-Z's "Dig A Hole"]

 I'm learning [the hard way] the pros and cons of compromising when it comes to the quality of life. My Life.

My heart is still BIG but the beat's different. That's all.

Grief and Loss. ..I wouldn't call us cool but I've met them. 

They may have knocked me on my a** and helped me up but I don't owe them no real favors. 

*looks in the mirror* but that girl, ..I owe her Everything.

I understand that I am not perfect and I don't have a desire to be.

There's simply no way that I can stay in the same mix if the cake's not rising.

-xx