Cultivate Harmony

In search of clarity? Me, too. Here's a Lau Tzu quote and a new meditation/poem to help us on our quest.

In Japan, 2009. photo by Emily Erwin.

Cultivate harmony within yourself, and harmony becomes real;
Cultivate harmony within your family, and harmony becomes fertile;
Cultivate harmony within your community, and harmony becomes abundant;
Cultivate harmony within your culture, and harmony becomes enduring;
Cultivate harmony within the world, and harmony becomes ubiquitous.

Live with a person to understand that person;
Live with a family to understand that family;
Live with a community to understand that community;
Live with a culture to understand that culture;
Live with the world to understand the world.

How can I live with the world?
By accepting.

-Lau Tzu, in the Tao Te Ching



In waiting for opportunity, I've denied it.
Fearing failure, I've dismissed success.
In struggling for ease, I've crafted difficulty.
Acquiescing, I've withheld my truth.
Asserting ability, I've forgone capacity.
Attempting to contain, I've lost control.

Welcoming humility, I dismiss failure.
Acknowledging fear, I banish shame.
Resisting action, I bypass reaction.
Accepting weakness, I allow release.
Declining responsibility, I dispel obligation.
Avoiding attention, I circumvent tension.

Imbalanced, I allow myself to fall.
Forgoing power, I regain self.

-a meditation on clarity, March 28, 2011
  

Sigh, sign, or SING!

While it's easy to be disheartened by Obama's continued approval of GMOs (three major crops in the past month!), it's even easier to join the number of people who are still rallying behind organics! In the end, it sugars down to one thing: do you sigh and give up, or sign and go on?

I've been thinking it's time for a written addition to the ongoing Gratitudes List, so here are my latest entries:

#3,586,427*: Making up silly, impromptu songs about daily life, and seeing how long I can keep up a rhyme scheme.

~ Singing said songs, adding a refrain, and remembering it in time for the next chorus!

~ Dance moves. Broadway style.

~ Adding harmonies, call & response, or round/barbershop quartet/doo-wop styles, and getting people to join in.

~ Turning the kitchen into a giant stage until the resident teenager threatens to emancipate herself early or the phone rings.

~ Catching Scott and the kids singing the same songs later.

* - give or take. I may have lost count.

It's a rough life, but somebody has to do it. What are you grateful for?