In the river of life

Washed-out halo of moon in the morning sky. Bright and breezy morning here in the Overberg, got up early to water the kitchen garden. Today is known locally as Boxing Day or Goodwill Day and there are church bells ringing because it is also Sunday. A blissful day with nothing to do and nowhere to go.

Had an email from a divorced woman friend full of rage and bitterness. Such a hard place to find oneself in at Christmas when all around you are playing at happy families. I kept thinking of James Baldwin’s perceptive insight:

“I imagine that one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, that they will be forced to deal with pain.”

Another friend on holiday in Thailand sent me a quotation on relationship. She is staying in a quiet village and meditating each morning up at the local monastery temple, going for long walks around green and watery rice paddies, carrying out a review of her life to date. 

As this year draws to an end I find myself doing something similar as I work on drafting out chapters and cutting back herbs. Where to now? More of the same or something different? What needs to change? Rather like mulling over the daily inventory on a larger scale, waiting for answers to emerge.

One might say that looking for love at all is looking for it in the wrong places, because behind that there is the idea that we can do something to make love happen or create it or somehow through a serious search, discover it or lure it out of hiding. This very activity of looking with a result in mind is somehow off the mark. In this there is something a bit too controlled or contrived; too much of “me”; that “me” that is the source of separation.  ―Doug Phillips

About these ads