I put a post up this past Saturday that included the well known quotation from Julian of Norwich and an add-on from me:

All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well. For there is a force of love moving through the universe that holds us fast and will never let us go. -Julian of Norwich- And if it moves through the universe, then it moves through me and it moves through you and the blue jay and the squirrel, and the lacy frame that once was a chestnut leaf…and glory, I find that so profoundly sustaining.

In part, I shared this for others who might find it helpful in current circumstances. In part, I shared it for me. I know that it is helpful to consciously, intentionally, remind myself of this essential constant…the force of love that is in all and for all and through all. And, ultimately, all shall be well…because this love can not let go.

At some point Sunday afternoon, I found myself in the Public Gardens with Rumi and read the line, You must have shadow and light source both. Listen, and lay your head under the tree of awe.

I loved that. In order for there to be both shadow and light source, there must be movement. Without movement, there’s either the constancy of light or the constancy of shadow, neither of which is whole, or is reflective of life’s both-and. And the second part–listening and laying my head under the tree of awe. What a capacity my head and heart and being share for holding the many aspects of what is real and true–the presence of shadow, the need for the light source–and what a need I have for awe, for listening to the real and true of both shadow and light and allowing both to be together and fully themselves.

And today, Monday, I was reading for a book group that will meet at the Spirituality Centre where I am the director and encountered a line from Rabindranath Tagore, The same stream of life that runs through my veins night and day runs through the world.

The stream of life that dances when hit with sunlight. The stream of life polluted with the harshness of reality. The stream that flows to cleanse itself. The stream that hosts a wildness of diversity and sustains it. The stream that cools, refreshes, and soothes. The stream in motion; seeking, finding, connecting; The stream running through my veins and running through the world.

I welcome these reminders on the page…and I welcome the reminders from those people/books of pauses, tales and curiosities, who know me and the encountered stories on two legs and four and wings and roots and stems…who don’t. The reminders that it is all, we are all, making our way through the mess and the wonder of what it is to be alive together on this earth. We all have light source and shadow, stream, and force of love drawing creation onward, homeward, toward a wholeness.

It is good to hold that these days as promise, as reminder, and as the centre weight that steadies until such a moment, together under the tree of awe, all is, at last, more well than we can imagine.