Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
As you read this I am flying across the country to perform in the last concert of the Montana Logging and Ballet Company. After performing music and comedy together as a quartet for 38 years, we’re retiring. (I guess it’s the opposite of a debut: an exbut? A World Postmiere? A swan song? A dodo song?) Anyway. We’ve sung all over the nation, played for Congress and vice presidents, worked with Bishop Tutu, been featured monthly on NPR… and Wednesday night it will all be over. So it goes.
Everything is passing. Seasons turn. Stories end. Vegetables rot. Businesses close. People retire. Loved ones die. Coupons expire. Students graduate. Seeds grow. We can drive ourselves nuts trying to cling to things, even as they slip away. Or we can stay lightly in the moment, attentive to what is, unattached, ready for the next moment as well, free to fully be in each moment as it passes. When we try to “make the moment last forever” we don’t actually experience the moment; we just experience our fear of its passing. Pay attention and be fully, lovingly present to what is, without trying to keep it or control it, and the passing things of this world will be more fully yours than if you froze them in time.
As I fly over the country, it passes smoothly beneath me. Nothing will turn it back; nor will anything turn back the losses of all those passing things in our lives. The point is not to stop the plane in mid-air. The point is to remember to look out the window.
________________
Weather report
Unrepeatable,
though the day will be of average temperature
and unremarkable light,
as the present moment
continually becomes itself.
________________
I’ll be off the rest of the week. I’ll see you again next Monday. Meanwhile, pay attention.
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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