Words of Inspiration

I’ve read this before, but it was brought to my attention again today. If you have not read it, I encourage you to take the time to do so… and then take a few extra moments to think about the meaning. When you have done that, I encourage you to pass this along to anyone who might need a bit of inspiration in their life. I can’t even put into words what this did for me today.

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“It does not interest me what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for and if you dare to dream your heart’s longing.

It does not interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dreams, for the adventure of being alive.

It does not interest me what planet is squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life’s betrayals, or have become shriveled and closed from fear and further pain.

I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it, fade it or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own, if you can dance with the wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, be realistic, or to remember the limitations of being human.

It does not interest me if the story you are telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself, if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul.

I want to know if you can be faithless and therefore be trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see beauty even when it is not pretty every day, and if you can source your life from God’s presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure, yours or mine, and still stand on the edge of a lake and shout to the silver of the moon, “Yes!”

It does not interest me to know here you live or how much money you have. I want to know if you can get up after a night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done for the children.

It does not interest me who you are, how you came to be here. I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.

It does not interest me where or what or with whom you have studied. I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away.

I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the quiet moments.”

–Oriah Mountain Dreamer

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It is easy to get caught up in the hustle and bustle of life. It’s easy to forget who we are. I want you to remember.

After a two week stay in Africa, these words ring especially true for me.

The beauty of poetry

I read a poem today written by a very dear friend.

It is the first poem I have read in a while, not counting my own, of course.

While I have always admired his ability to say what I am feeling, to convey the messages that I cannot yet find the words for, today, I was overcome.

I read his poem outloud, as I often do when I am alone and appreciating poetry, and from the first half of the second line, I was crying. I wasn’t crying because it was sad, I was crying because it was beautiful.

I can’t even being to remember the last time I cried at such beauty in words. Well, okay, maybe I can… but it’s been far too long.

It also reassured me that there ARE people out there who think the way I think, who feel the way I feel, and who express themselves in the way that I am most accustom to expressing myself.

Lately, I haven’t been writing anything substantial. What I do write is nothing more than morbid, self pitying garbage. It was truly wonderful to read something so moving.

This is a man who inspired over 200 of some of my best poems. A man who literally shattered my heart and then felt so terribly about if afterward that he tried to put it back together, effectively shattering his own heart as well.

Over the years we have both had time to heal and I am PROUD to say that we have maintained a wonderful, albeit complicated, friendship, but how many worth while friendships have you had that haven’t been complicated?

I’d like to take this time to publicly thank him for writing such beautiful words. I find that I feed off of the beauty of his words, and can only hope that I will be able to produce something beautiful of my own some time in the very near future.

Thank you, my friend.

Beauty is the Innocence of a Child – Photography

Perfect Imperfection

Time comes to a stop
The whole world falls away
She peaks beneath the shadows
Of the cold and lonely day

She knows not who she is
She knows not what she does
She travels in only darkness
She fears the light because

The light exposes truth
Reveals the things she fears
And when she’s in the dark
No one can see her tears

But now something has come over her
She can see the stars
And the moon illuminates her face
And erases all her scars

And a realization happens
And she wants the world to see
She is as perfectly imperfect
As anyone can be

And knowing this gives her joy
And as she stands beneath the sun
She smiles at the world
To whom she is no one

And the earth beholds the beauty
Sparkling in her eyes
They see shining perfection
Hidden beneath the lies

And for the first time they behold
The girl she tried to hide
The one left in the darkness
Buried deep inside