Sometimes the only thing
I knew to do
was to keep going,
which undoubtedly meant
surrendering to the creative flow
of life.
And so there was the
painful dropping of pieces
I had held so carefully
and an understanding
I seemed to have with God
that I would sometimes
hold on a little longer,
push ahead,
lose my center,
and struggle to find any
resemblance of grace.
But I would always keep going.
It was the small miracles,
the quiet inspirations, that kept my heart
pressing on long enough
to find a path that didn’t lead
further away from itself.
It was the gentle, comforting way
words formed out of nothingness
and courage was found
to look challenges in the face —
knowing the transformative power
of surrender first hand.
It was the remembrance of the
turning away from my own heart
and that first step
taken to find a way back.
When I looked back, after a while, the story I had carried had faded. It was the subtler, sometimes painfully subtle story beyond the surface that kept my attention.
It was the faint memory of all the times I had managed to allow a quieting, just enough to hear the quiet prayer spoken from my own heart — somewhere long ago.
It was each moment I had allowed my heart to remain open, even though I was sure I didn’t know how to continue on, that had woven a more beautiful story — somehow.
I let go,
trusting that wherever
the pieces fall will
be okay —
possibly even more
beautiful than if
I had tried to fit
them together
on my own.
— Laurie, What’s Right Here
May I be guided today by grace. May I have the patience to wait for higher thoughts. May I be moved by inspiration and love and creative flow — viewing each experience that crosses my path as an alternate route to tenderness. Amen
I wish to reflect
all that is soft,
to offer my love
to all that is not —
to remind us
of the sacredness
of the journey
and the beauty
in the transformation.
— Laurie, What’s Right Here
I learned to look for the light in every experience, no matter how dark it looked at first glance. It meant being willing to not know exactly how situations would transform, while knowing they would in fact transform.
It meant being willing to be still in my heart and diligent with thoughts while daring to place my feet in the world of form.
There was a delicate softening — the transformation into tenderness. Tenderness spilled over again and again from the ever-present quiet prayer within my deepest heart.
It took a little practice, but I learned to remain in my heart. I learned to honor all that was painful while holding space for tenderness.
I began to sink into my heart a little more each time I remembered I had the option to remain there. Experiences that seemed unhealable at first glance began to reflect the softening in my own heart.
There was pain in returning to wholeness. It was painful to reach back to parts of myself stuck in the past. And it was painful to begin to feel the pain of others as my own pain.
But there was no turning back. There was a tenderness in tapping into truth that I was unwilling to let go of again. And so I continued to meet each unfolding moment from a state of prayer — trusting in life to meet me. It felt like a huge risk, but I had been in that place before.
Maybe it was seeing the stories on the surface become unbearable that made jumping into the unknown seem less scary for a moment. Perhaps it was having been touched so deeply by the sharing of others or the desire to play a part in the shattering of old patterns of suffering. Perhaps it was a combination of these things that caused my heart to make a gesture to future generations through healing and softening my own heart a little more. How could I not?
