Fear is our only impediment.
Add it to a compost pile, turn it with tools of love and forgiveness.
Forgive yourself first.
[image source: Scott's Compost Pile]
Rumi in the evening...
When someone is counting out gold for you,
don't look at your hands or the gold.
Look at the giver.
[image source: ecrocks]
Rumi in the evening...
Unless these words fill with nourishment from the unseen, they will stay empty.
a spiral galaxy...image source
Opening for Possibility... (morning burnout blip)
Tune in to your natural rhythm
by not trying to force things to happen,
opening for possibility in each moment, listening.
[image source © Elsah Cort]
Rumi in the evening...
Listen to the great heart coming from within the body,
a lion's roar from the shape of a deer.
[image source: NY Times]
Rumi in the evening...
"This place is a dream. Only a sleeper considers it real."
[image source: zazenlife.com]
Rumi lines from a poem called "The Dream That Must Be Interpreted"
in The Essential Rumi, New Expanded Edition,
very profound reading for tonight.
.
The next lines after the ones above are:
"Then death comes like dawn,
and you wake up laughing at what you thought was your grief....."
Waiting...
Earth shows us how to patiently wait for rain to fall,
so roots can surge forth from the unseen.
Water your soul this way.
| morning burnout blip |
Rumi in the evening...
"God is pleased when your love realizes
it is part of something oceanic
and begins to move with the whole."
[blue ocean image source ]
One Step...
Take your directions from your inner voice,
not from what others tell you to do.
Each step leads to your next one. Simple.
| morning burnout blip |
"The Fairy's Tightrope" by Arthur Rackham [image source]
Rumi in the evening...
"Let your prayer be pure praise, not begging
for something to happen, or not happen."
[photo source unknown, found on goggle images]
Mountain Burnout Retreats for Nursing Burnout
Re-Membering the Healer's Spirit
from The Deeper Well....
Originally designed for nurses with burnout, the retreat is open and adaptable to anyone. It is great fit for artists, writers, and creative persons wanting to delve deeper, and more abstractly, into the source of our creativity. The retreat has its basic "bones" for the presentation, but also follows an organic path that shows up with each group. A wonderful handout is given which includes many resources for further investigation.
Retreats are scheduled per individual request. Minimum of four persons is encouraged, but retreats can be scheduled even for one person.
To schedule a retreat, call 559.561.4671 or email elsahc@dishmail.net
Offering 24 hours CE's for CA nurses, many other states also accept California CE's
California Nursing Board Provider #13161
3 day retreat: registration fee is $595 (for 1-3 persons), $495 (for 4 or more persons)
(includes cost of books used for inspirational reading assignments)
Deposit of $300 required at time of registration, the rest is due the first day of retreat. Cancellation must be made 2 weeks in advance for refund of deposit, minus $100 fee. MasterCard, VISA, Discover and personal checks accepted.
The retreat size is limited to eight persons to foster a smaller group experience. The retreat starts on day one in the morning and ends on day three in the evening. It is advised that only persons who are enrolled in the workshop accompany you for the retreat. For lodging located nearby in Three Rivers, visit threeriversvillage.com. You can also stay at my bed and breakfast cottage next door, see cortcottage.com for details.
[Lake Kaweah at the entrance to Three Rivers, California, photo © Elsah Cort]
About the Retreat
The retreat is organized around six passages, with one and six occurring before and after the retreat. Each passage involves individual reading assignments, some creative projects including mandala making as a contemplative exercise, gathering together for group sharing, and a directed meditative walk among the Giant Sequoia trees at Crescent Meadow in Giant Forest in Sequoia National Park (if snow has closed the road to the meadow, an alternate site with a shorter walk will be chosen, along with time spent in nature at lower elevations.)
Retreat Objectives
1. To present the participant with an opportunity to engage "job burnout" as a creative process, one that is dynamic, organic and inherently healthy.
2. To provide foundational information about origins and stages of burnout, both from the individual's perspective and within a broader nursing professional perspective.
3. To allow for a retreat setting to encourage the participant to read, journal, and discuss a diverse range of ideas, approaches and bases of knowledge about many aspects of healing.To offer practical ways to experience burnout transformation.
4. To offer practical ways to experience burnout transformation.
5. To support the person in this experiential exploration in ways that are compatible within a holistic healing philosophy.
6. To nurture what happens without judgment, preconceived ideas or pressure. To allow for a natural enfoldment of the person's own process, one that intertwines within the person's professional practice.
7. To serve and support the person's re-membering of spirit, enhancing the dignity of the human spirit and bringing healing and authenticity to the world.
[Crescent Meadow in Sequoia National Park, photo © Elsah Cort]
Breathe-In Heart
Thoughts come, thinking they are the only reality,
then breath intercedes quietly intertwined with heartbeat.
Notice this.
| morning burnout blip |
[photo from highresolution-wallpapers.net]
____________________________________________________
:: Re-Membering the Healer's Spirit ::
mountain burnout retreats for everyone
Step one, two, three...
1 :: Sense the authentic vision of your life and work....listen to the inner messages, the ones that you often ignore or bury, and uncover the deeper, core material.
2 :: Water all subtle seeds of your vision...be open to what sprouts that show up and let them all move past the seedling stage into stems, leaves and blossoms.
3 :: Then let it be...don't try to re-work it all or push it into an old pattern of control
:: Live Via Essence ::
original photograph © Elsah Cort
Rumi in the evening...
Rumi: Be the moisture in an oyster that helps to form one pearl.
[photo source is google images from an obsure website]
Rumi in the evening...
Rumi: Soul keeps unfolding inward.
The body leaves the body.
A wealth you cannot imagine flows through you.
Satellite image via webdesignerdepot.com
courtesy of the USGS National Center for the EROS
and NASA Landsat Project Science Office
Niger River, Massina Mali – Coursing through parched, landlocked Mali in Western Africa, the Niger River skirts the edge of the dune-striped Sahara before turning sharply south to join the Bani River. At the confluence of the two rivers is an inland delta complete with narrow, twisting waterways, lagoons, and tiny islands.
Rumi says...
Rumi: Stay together friends. Don't scatter and sleep.
Our friendship is made of being awake.
Digital collage by Robert Mertens, one of The Hatchery artists from Badger, CA
______________________________________________________
[While working on this post, I got an email linking to a blog post
titled "Why Do We Sleep?" as my cat was curled up sleeping--and snoring--nearby.]
The Secret Gardener...
This morning I watched a large (brilliant blue) blue jay fly to the ground near my house with a big pointy green acorn in its beak. He then pushed away some of the dry weeds that were missed by the weedeater this summer, and pounded the acorn into the ground. First time I have seen my secret gardener in action.
No wonder I have a valley oak growing so close by near the bedroom window, putting me in such a dilemma for the last couple of years. I just could not pull it up, and it tapped down its long root so fast and deep. In five years or so, it will obstruct the view from the window. But, in 10 years maybe it can be used to prop up the house, which is leaning a bit in that direction.
And now, a new tree may be sprouting any day thanks to my secret blue jay gardener.
No, this is not this morning's blue jay, or my own photo. It's from birdwatchingdaily.com.
Rumi-scrying...
Rumi: As wind through a field stirs wildflower scent,
by music-light fresh beauties appear.
This is all I want.
Mariposa Lily: a California native wildflower
photo © Elsah Cort
Origin...at least one of them
Origin digital collage from a single photograph © Elsah Cort
The Face of Love...
Rumi: Love is the vital core of the soul, and of all you see, only love is infinite.
The Face of Love: digital collage © Elsah Cort
The Face of Love II digtal collage © Elsah Cort
Occupy Metamorphosis
I've been thinking of the metamorphosis of the on-going "occupy" movements that are spreading all over the planet. It could be that this outer (group) expression is a way for the universe to remind us that we need to "occupy" our own body, our true spirit, our time-space positions as whole, conscious beings.
When we each occupy ourselves fully and honestly, then each and every space on this planet changes. This occupy movement is not so much about taking control, but rather about the "being" of a human being. It is not an accident of group-mind that this is the word that came forth at this moment in time and living history.
I am choosing to occupy here and now.
"Source" digital image from original mandala © Elsah Cort
Available as a greeting card at The Other Shore Market.
Show Up As You Are...
"Show Up As You Are"
Digital collage from a single photograph, 8x10 inches © Elsah Cort
from the MindMap Series
[There are imperfections in the layers of this collage, showing up as they are.]
Listen to the Inner Conversation...
"Listen to the Inner Conversation"
| 8 x 10 inch digital collage from a single photograph |
from the MindMap Series © Elsah Cort
Life is immeasurable....art-making
"life is immeasurable"
new collage from the mindmap series © Elsah Cort
[made from one photograph, 8x10 inches]
Rumi: Be relentless in your looking, because you are the one you seek.
[Self Seeking Self, painting by Rein Nomm]
Through the Looking-Glass...
Is this the day I finally wash some windows? For a while now I have been looking at the mountains through a window that is framed with cobwebs on the outside. And I have been feeling the pressure of not having washed this window, just yet. I need to do it when the sun is not shining on it, I tell myself. Another thought comes, more of a wish, that I could have a better technique or use a better window-washing liquid, to get this window finally clean, as I remember how windows never seem clean enough after I wash them. I take some thinking time to try to visualize myself actually getting the window washed. I add some judgment to the thought-mix, admonishing myself for not washing the window yet, more pressure and inertia. The window remains unwashed.
And the spiders? They seem to have abandoned their webs on this window (that's why I can call them cobwebs now) and they are moving house to another window nearby.
The living metaphor of this window-viewing and spider-teaching is telling me about clarity and vision, and seeing beyond, and in spite of, my distractions and procrastinations. And the spiders, they are keepers of the alphabet and writing, and they spin webs with such ease and not much planning.
All this comes from looking out of the window this morning as I write.
[Spider Web by Julie Falk]
________________________________________________________________
[Addendum: one week later, windows are washed...October 19, 2011]
Rumi: Be concentrated and leonine in the hunt for what is your true nourishment.
[photo by Maradentro via The Big Cat Blog]
Pervasive change is upon us. We can't stop it anymore than we can extend the early morning twilight, to delay the sunrise.
Lately I have been personally experiencing a digging in of my heels (with pain in one of them showing up) and I know that, as much as I welcome and long for change, I also resist it in any way I can. It's futile of course. We are all changing each and every second. The universe can't help itself, it's nature is change and more change.
When one of us brings forth that which is in us, then everyone and everything is changed. A commercial comes on TV just as I am writing this post, from a bank who is saying they can make it easier when it is time for a change. Nothing is really easy about change...but when you jump into the stream, you are supported by every wave.
Today's sunrise by Zoe Nishimuta,
who posts her sunrises every morning on twitter and facebook
Rumi: Day and night I guarded the pearl of my soul.
Now in this ocean of pearling currents, I've lost track of which was mine.
Mindmap One: photographic digital collage © Elsah Cort
Rumi: The truth of a human being is an empty table made of soul intelligence.
[table at the Monastery of Alcobaça in Portugal]
Rumi: Consider this metaphor. How you love is the open sky.
These personal selves are the separate roofs of a town.
[image source: asymptotia.com]
Rumi: Wherever the soul came from,
and wherever it goes at night, my roof is in that direction.
Treemind: digital collage © Elsah Cort
Rumi: Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder. Help someone's soul heal.
Walk out of your house like a shepherd.
[lamps by industrial designer, Sergio Silva]
Rumi: Silence is the best alchemy.
image source: alchemyglass.com
Leaning Toward the Center
I am still trying to lean toward the center...and bring all writing, ideas, art and life's mixed media here to this blog hub.
"Leaning Toward the Center" photo taken at the Hatchery on Saturday
© Elsah Cort
[part of a new Hatchery photos series coming to birth this week...]
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