Underwater

"Circle me O God 

Keep hope within 

Despair without."  

David Adam

There are times in life when what we see is not always what is there.  Actually, I'm not sure that is true at all.  What we see is in fact what "we" see.  Perhaps what I am thinking about is how much we miss.  This is a picture taken of a stream.  Water is flowing quickly, waves ripple along the surface, a leaf is moving swiftly to it's next destination.  Upon first glance would you have guessed that the grass and stones are under the flowing water?  I ask this all with the assumption that you looked at the picture at all.  

So much of life is right there for us to see and experience.  I am beginning some reading on Celtic Spirituality.  Today I begin a book of daily readings that I would like to share.  "Praying with Celtic Saints, Prophets, Martyrs, and Poets", by June Skinner Sawyers.  

"The Celts had a deep reverence for the land and for nature itself.  Ritual was an important part of their daily life.  More important, thought, was the belief that God resides everywhere, in everyone, and in everything.  At heart, they were poets, and it is this poetic spirit, shining through their spirituality that people find so appealing today."

The last couple of weeks for me have been ones of great learning.  Not book learning, not the kind of learning that I will ever be tested for, at least not in the traditional sense.  But a learning about who I am, who we all are, and what I want to do in my life.  

As a young person there was much to be thinking about.  Each stage of our lives brings new concerns, new possibilities.  We come into the world with the powerful and important lessons of eating, sleeping, and the advanced skill of rolling over.  Time goes on and with that comes the many developmental challenges that are appropriate for who we are.  I have been struck recently just how much of our lives are spent learning to navigate the world around us, learning who we are in relation to our surroundings, and trying to find our own path.  

As we grow and learn we look around our environment, our families and friends for clues and lessons about what this whole life thing is about.  Over time we grow and change, we live and learn, we come to know that the work here is really to become our own individual.  God created us all in God's image and yet all uniquely different.  We are each called to be exactly who we need to be and then live in the world in a way that serves to make this world a better place.  

OK, so what do you see?  How is that journey going?  Where are you on that path?  


"There are other qualities as well: a mindfulness, a being present in the moment, a celebration of place, and a sense of unity with all of the earth's creatures.  It is an all-encompassing spirituality that, at its fundamental best, is life affirming."  


For each of us there comes a time when we must really embrace who we are, who we are becoming and what we want this life to be.  As an adult woman, my life looks very differently than my mothers did.  There are many wonderful gifts that she left me with, many ways of being that I treasure.  But with those gifts and my history, I have a new story.  With God's help, what do I want that to look like?  


Today I rejoice in the life I have been blessed with.  Today I want to see my journey as open to the infinite possibilities known only to God.  Today I pray to notice the barriers that I erect, and move past them.  


"The Presence of God is an eternal fact.  He never leaves us alone or forsakes us.  It is when we lose sight of Him that we falter and sink beneath the waves. "   David Adam