Fragment 4 - Peace I Leave With You
Today, like every day, is a beginning. Take a breath now as though nothing has gone before this moment.
- Stand with your feet hip-width apart, flat on the ground.
- Gently bounce up and down.
- Let your arms loosen and flick, as if shaking water from your fingertips.
It doesn’t need to be serious or still. Sometimes the quickest path to stillness is through movement — letting the body drop what it’s holding so the breath and the mind can follow.
We carry more than we know.
Little tensions, scraps of thought, the day’s noise. Shaking doesn’t solve them, but it loosens their grip. Try it for half a minute. More, if it feels good.
When you stop, notice what’s different.
Even if nothing feels different, notice that too.
This week, I received a wonderful card from a dear friend and client. It read like a blessing, and it connected me to two ideas I’ve written about before:
- The power of words to shelter us
- The power we each possess to bless one another
*Both ideas come from two beloved Irish poets and spiritual mentors: John O’Donohue and John Moriarty. Two Johns who spoke in very different voices, both of whom left us too soon.
To Bless the Space Between Us
Some beautiful words from John O'Donohue via the magic of Audiobook. Do you guys have Audible? Let me know if you don't, and I'll try to find something suitable on YouTube.
Blessings come from the heart, and we live in a hard world to be walking around with hearts open and outward.
So maybe we can begin with some inside-voice blessings:
- A silent blessing for the postie as the mail drops through the letterbox.
- A blessing for the mums and dads waving their children off to school.
- A blessing for the driver who cut you off in traffic, for the stressful and urgent life he must lead.
Shelter From the Storm
As to my first point, John Moriarty viewed words and stories not as abstract ideas on a page but as a very real....realer than real in fact...shelter. He would turn to sacred texts and stories to buttress against unknown psychic forces.
Personally, I've often used the following mantra, given to me by my wife, as an anchor in times of great uncertainty...
IAM SAFE
IAM WHOLE
IAM HOME
I've also taken great comfort in Julian of Norwich's graceful words...
Do you have your own words that soften you or have held you when you've needed them?
“Therefore I say: sink from your something into your nothing, and so return to the ground from which you are born.” — Meister Eckhart
Fragments are small offerings of stillness — a breath, a line of poetry, a brief reflection. Each one is simple enough to hold in a moment, but together they build something larger, like pieces of stained glass slowly forming a window.
By returning each day, we practise the art of beginning again. Nothing dramatic, nothing forced. Just a pause, a fragment, a chance to let the light through.