Tag: think

Meditate on Things…

“Sure Man was born to meditate on things,

And to contemplate the eternal springs

Of God and Nature…”

Thomas Traherne, “Dumbness”

Colemere is small, tranquil lake in North Shropshire, which I have posted about before, and this beautiful mute swan lingered near the banks on a recent visit.

Reflection seems to be as natural for us as humans as it is to the surface of water, and it is something that is distinctively human.

Colemere

I saw beauty in these simple, but complex, reflections of light and dark on the surface of the water, just as I did in the simple white beauty of the swan.

And I agreed with Thomas Traherne: “Sure Man was born to meditate on things“.

His lines are from a beautiful, thoughtful poem called “Dumbness” (in the sense of not being able to speak), and you can read the full poem here.

When the world speaks to us in such beautiful, reflective ways, it is good, very good.

I hope these reflections, and Traherne’s poetry, have spoken to you.

Balance your being

How do you balance daily tasks, the demands of other people, work, leisure, and looking after yourself?  This post draws on ancient wisdom to explore a way of answering this tricky question: how do you balance your being for a Lif4Gd?

“Mindfulness” is a popular word today but its roots go back hundreds and thousands of years. I am reminded of this whenever I go past Shrewsbury Abbey, local to me, founded nearly a thousand years ago.  There is a beautiful window portraying St. Benedict over the entrance, and Benedictine monks knew a lot about mindfulness.

The St. Benedict window, Shrewsbury Abbey, courtesy of Frankie Hartland

Maintain

Equilibrium

.

As you balance

Your being

.

Though juggling

Balls of fire

.

Grateful

For those moments

.

Of tranquil

Transition

.

Gliding through

Blue skies of peace.

For me, life sometimes feels like “juggling balls of fire”; Lif4Gd requires though “blue skies of peace”. But how do we find them?

Benedictine monks balanced manual labour with times of meditation and prayer.  There were set times of “doing” and “being”.  There was a regular rhythm to each day, a deliberate intent to maintain equilibrium.  And of course they understood their life from a cosmic perspective.

I start every day with a time of silence.  It helps put life in perspective.  It creates a space for reading, thinking, prayer. 

How do you maintain equilibrium and balance in your life?

Some Questions to Ponder

  1. Have you consciously created balance and equilibrium in your life somehow?  What did you do?  What could you do?
  2. When you focus on “being” and not just “doing”, how do you understand that “being”?  What framework do you use to think about life?

Do leave a comment if this post has made you think. Lif4Gd was set up to be interactive, and enjoy hearing readers’ thoughts.

Best wishes,

Michael