Be Still

The past few weeks have been chock full of activity: end of school, visits from friends and relatives, travel for business and pleasure, work and volunteer obligations - the list is endless. This weekend, take a moment and go sit in your garden. That's right, just sit. Don't think, don't fret about garden tasks undone, don't replant that corner in your mind. Just be still.

Claude Monet - Woman Sitting in a Garden, 1876

Blessing in the Chaos 

To all that is chaotic
in you,
let there come silence.

Let there be
a calming
of the clamoring,
a stilling
of the voices that
have laid their claim
on you,
that have made their
home in you,

that go with you
even to the
holy places
but will not
let you rest,
will not let you
hear your life
with wholeness
or feel the grace
that fashioned you.

Let what distracts you
cease.
Let what divides you
cease.
Let there come an end
to what diminishes
and demeans,
and let depart
all that keeps you
in its cage.

Let there be
an opening
into the quiet
that lies beneath
the chaos,
where you find
the peace
you did not think
possible
and see what shimmers
within the storm.
  --- John O'Donohue