Grateful for the Abundant Spring Snow!
…we are ultimately at choice about how we flavor the soup that life presents us and, indeed, the very ingredients of that soup.
I’m immersed in the soup of change this week. Adjusting to life without the physical presence of Zadie Byrd amidst news of health and housing challenges from friends and the horrors of genocide, hunger, and continuing environmental degradation in the world beyond. The shifting schedule of a friend travelling across the country and a desire to connect, if only for a brief hug and ‘cup o’ joe’. Snuggling in as a spring storm blesses with a deep blanket of snow.
How will I dance with these? With change? With Life?
On every level it seems this soup that is Life is a soup of change, inviting us to choose ingredients with awareness and care. To focus right where we are, dancing with what is present for us to dance with, choosing our steps with love and care – each of us a ‘cell’ in the greater whole of Life.
An awareness that the passing of a canine companion pales in comparison to the depth of personal and global tragedies rises in me. I set it aside knowing that Life is not about comparison. Comparison is but one of the tools that keeps us separate and leads to othering, to competition, and ultimately to war. A seemingly harmless habit of mind to compare self to another, better than, worse than … an almost endless list.
Surely the heart with its deep knowing of oneness doesn’t engage in this separation game. May my heart lead.
Adjusting to life without Zades’ physical presence. Without Dog. With God. Tears fall into the soup along with a bitter spice or two – a dash of regret that Zadie never experienced the delight of romping with other canines, even though she overcame much of her reactivity to them; a sprinkle of sadness that she didn’t love exploring these woods as much as her human does.
These seasonings bring forth the fullness of flavors, of the soup with its main ingredients: love, joy, peace, satisfaction, freedom, openness; all flowing deep in this heart. A flow created in working with and observing this tenacious, courageous canine as she learned to trust and to open to love. To smile and be happy.
Much like her human, Zadie Byrd’s way was quiet, solo, retreat-like. She simply needed the environment in which to do ‘her work’: calling forth and BEcoming the soul dog within. I didn’t know that of course when I reluctantly said ‘yes’ to bring 10-year-old ‘Sadie’ home from the shelter. But I learned, and she guided me along the sometimes very bumpy way, teaching me patience as she learned to trust and to partner with a human.
Perhaps her greatest teachings are apropos for these chaotic times: Find your peace in the turmoil for this too shall pass. Slow down, pause, sniff, act, rest. Patience.
Amid the turbulent ‘soup’ of these times, personally and collectively, we are ultimately at choice about how we flavor the soup that life presents and, indeed, the very ingredients of that soup. These times call us to bring forth the authentic beings that we are and to add our best ingredients to the soup of change that is the soup of Life: heart-centered love.
May we choose each thought, each word, each act with heart-felt awareness of our role in the greater whole of Life so that each thought, each word, each act supports transforming the soup of darkness into a soup of light. May I.
Snowy Vista