Thought for The Day - A Long and Full Journey

A Thousand Miles in a day...

No color, no sound; then a rush of subdued grays, a muted light filtering through the window. A long power driven whoosh of a motorcycle riding by. The warm feeling of the bed under the left side of my body from shoulder to feet and pulling back the bed spread to rise...

Mid day, bright sunlight, music from my headphones mixing with the sound of cars driving by. Each step taken, leaving the building for a rejuvenating walk, faces are met, perhaps a nod, a slight smile. Faces I've never seen before and may never see again. In groups of twos or threes, others out for a walk to lunch, more about the conversation than filling the stomach, but a blend of both. The pavement is uneven in spots and my feet slowly adjust to the unevenness. Slowly, I increase my step to force muscles, tendon and bones to work out a morning of sitting too much. Body begins to warm and before long the water runs from the right side of my forehead...

...It's another day's journey and in it, I've observed, words, thoughts, impressions and suppositions.

...A Thousand Miles is only a fraction of the journey...

Thought for The Day - In an Instant

Like grains of sand, our thoughts and sensations occur, in an instant. We are seeing hearing, feeling, tasting and analyzing. We are thinking, reasoning, doubting, hoping, losing and winning, all in an instant. We evaluate, judge, discern, condemn, self-correct and self-deprecate, in an instant. This amazing mass of energy, housed in this mass of flesh! It's capacity to guide, direct, to love and hate is limitless!

In a moment, we are capable of changing the direction of our lives. While "external stimuli" may guide our steps, so often, the true inspiration is internal, in our hearts and mind. When we are certain our lives will continue in "this way," something tragic or glorious comes along and we have a new reason to live! And that new direction, while it seems to come out of "nowhere," it was always there, inside you. You may not have welcomed the interruption to your mundane life, but in the long run, you will appreciate the shift, because you took hold of the reigns of your life and turned it around! 

The best planning, the best education and intentions...in an instant...

Thought for The Day - Eyes Wide Open

Study for Pre-Dawn Light 18 x 24 Charcoals

In a day's time, in the instance of a moment, there is so much we can absorb and take in. Actually our senses take in far more than our conscious mind will acknowledge; our reasoning filters out far more than we would acknowledge. But let's consider what we might dismiss, the stuff our 'filter' sees but refuses to acknowledge.

In traffic, on the way to work - work and our feelings about it (good, bad and ambivalent) being our primary focus - we pass others. We drive by them, beside them and see them in our rear view mirror. We see them, but we don't; we see faces and the same tell-tale indicators in their expression as in ours. Someone is struggling with a decision about a spouse or 'significant other' oblivious to their pain. There is someone who has a child that is capable of so much more, but is that child falling into the steps of me, the parent, who also could do much more? What about the story behind the eyes of a homeless man or woman, or the person pretending to be? What motivates someone to stand on street corners and beg for money when they have a place to stay, food and perhaps a car? And how different is that from you and I, living from paycheck to paycheck, the modern day equivalent of hand-to-mouth existence?

At work, 'hello, good morning' and small talk break up the work load. But how much truth are we ignoring in the words of our 'work-family?' More importantly, how much of our own soul's cry and longing for the 'abundant life' goes unanswered?