"Necessary Fire"

A few thoughts on the ageless questions: Who am I? and What is the purpose of my life?

Sue Monk Kidd & Ann Kidd Taylor, Student Address, Columbia College

“The novelist John Gardner suggested that the true search in life is for one’s  “necessary fire.” I believe he was referring to the genuine, inborn desire in one’s heart– the one that feels required, as if it is part of your purpose for being here. Your necessary fire is an endeavor that holds the possibility to bring you alive, but also one with which you have a deep compatibility, a true affinity …

Find a purpose grand enough for your life, and whatever your necessary fire turns out to be, remember that in some way it is necessary for the world, too. Try to love the world despite what you see out there. Go, make your big, beautiful dent.  And as you do, come down often on the side of boldness. If you err, may it be for too much audacity, not too little. For you really are enough. You have untold strengths and undreamed resources inside of you. You have your glorious self.”

Frederick Buechner:

“You are called to the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.”    

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Let’s not miss the reality of our inner self through inattention:

Friedrick Buechner

"We are all of us more mystics than we believe or choose to believe...We have seen more than we let on, even to ourselves. Through some moment of beauty or pain, some subtle turning of our lives, we catch glimmers at least of what the saints are blinded by; only then, unlike the saints, we go on as though nothing has happened."

"Hidden Places" - where new beginnings are birthed

 “For a New Beginning” 
 by John O’Donohue

In out-of-the-way places of the heart,

Where your thoughts never think to wander,

This beginning has been quietly forming,

Waiting until you were ready to emerge…

Though your destination is not yet clear

You can trust the promise of this opening;

Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning

That is at one with your life’s desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;

Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;

Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,

For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

Cracked Pots

one of my garden pots

I love Sue Bender's writings about "cracked pots" recognizing that one may indeed look at whole, broken and mended pots in relation to one's own life.  As she quotes M.C.Richards, "It's not pots we are forming, it's ourselves."

In Everyday Sacred, Sue Bender writes, "We start out whole. Complete. Along the way, we may feel that something is wrong, or missing, We aren't the way we'd like to be or the way we think we should be.  A crossroads, a new stage in life, a turning point, a crisis, when we feel we may crack, or we do crack, can be a difficult, frightening time.

And, sometimes we deliberately crack our own bowl... With time and great care and tender patience, we can re-examine the pieces, knowing that when we are ready, a solution will come.  We can glue the pieces back together.

This bowl looks far more interesting, more beautiful than before it broke.  The pieces are the same, but it's a different bowl than when I started...Our imperfections are a gift, the very qualities that make us unique.  If we make the shift to see them that way - we can value ourselves...just as we are."

Now I have yet to locate a "mended" pot to check out its beauty and usefulness, but I do choose to believe that a "mended" soul produces a more beautiful person.

My sister, Michelle, was, perhaps still is, a potter and has made beautiful bowls, vases, and plates a few of which have made their way to my house. I love these bowls!!

Michelle is also a quilter, and somehow I think a quilter is similar to a "mender of broken pots" in that a quilter purposely cuts beautiful material into pieces and then mends/sews them together into a beautiful quilt... a quilt might be a good picture of one's life.

You can check out Michelle's creative endeavours at this link: 
http://periwinklequiltingandbeyond.blogspot.com/

Spiritual Reading

Reading often means gathering information, acquiring new insights and knowledge, and mastering a new field.  It can lead us to degrees, diplomas, and certificates.  Spiritual reading however, is different.  It means not simply reading about spiritual things but also reading about spiritual things in a spiritual way...As we read spiritually about spiritual things, we open our hearts to God's voice.  Sometimes we must be willing to put down the book we are reading and just listen to what God is saying to us through its words.

From Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith by Henri J. M. Nouwen, 1997