Wednesday, February 6, 2019

Between the act of awakening and the act of surrender (John O'Donohue)


  We live between the act of awakening and the act of surrender.  Each morning we awaken to the light and the invitation to a new day in the world of time; each night we surrender to the dark to be taken in the world of dreams where time is no more.  At birth we were awakened and emerged to become visible in the world.  At death we will surrender again to the dark to become invisible.  Awakening and surrender:  they frame each day and each life; between them the journey where anything can happen, the beauty and the frailty.  When the Celtic imagination searched for the structures of shelter and meaning, it raised its eyes to the mountains and heavens and put its trust in the faithful patterns of sun, stars, moon and seasons… [A]ll frailty and uncertainty was seen to be sheltered by eternal beauty which presides over all the journeys between awakening and surrender, the visible and the invisible, the light and the darkness.

  The soul is hungry for beauty… For a while the strains of struggle and endurance are relieved and our frailty is illuminated by a different light in which we come to glimpse beyond the shudder of appearances the sure form of things.

--John O’Donohue, Beauty, The Invisible Embrace


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