Davison's Doodle

The First Week in Lent

These words by an unknown author are some of the best I know for those that wrestle with what to do or how to be during Lent.

Fast from judgment, Feast on compassion 
Fast from greed, Feast on sharing 
Fast from scarcity, Feast on abundance 
Fast from fear, Feast on peace 
Fast from lies, Feast on truth 
Fast from gossip, Feast on praise 
Fast from anxiety, Feast on patience 
Fast from evil, Feast on kindness 
Fast from apathy, Feast on engagement 
Fast from discontent, Feast on gratitude 
Fast from noise, Feast on silence 
Fast from discouragement, Feast on hope 
Fast from hatred, Feast on love 
What will be your fast? What will be your feast?
(Unknown Author, “Ash Wednesday.”)

Another Orbit

Four days into another orbit. Reflect on failure, lessons, and look forward. Make resolutions, set goals, and dream wild audacious dreams. Everything is possible. Based on previous orbits there is high confidence in the probable even with the disruptors, disrupting. Transitions. It is one of those years when people I know will have a zero or five birthday. I’ve lived long enough that mentors and friends, artists and inspirers have begun passing from this reality to the next.

Be present. Be proactive. Really live.

I revisit Bob Dylan’s, “Forever Young,” when a new year arrives. And this O’Donohue poem resonates too.

Beannacht / Blessing
by John O’Donohue, Echoes of Memory, 2011

On the day when
The weight deadens
On your shoulders
And you stumble,
May the clay dance
To balance you.

And when your eyes
Freeze behind
The grey window
And the ghost of loss
Gets into you,
May a flock of colours,
Indigo, red, green
And azure blue,
Come to awaken in you
A meadow of delight.

When the canvas frays
In the currach of thought
And a stain of ocean
Blackens beneath you,
May there come across the waters
A path of yellow moonlight
To bring you safely home.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
May the clarity of light be yours,
May the fluency of the ocean be yours,
May the protection of the ancestors be yours.

And so may a slow
Wind work these words
Of love around you,
An invisible cloak
To mind your life.