Weekly Words: Discovering the True Wonder of You

"What may be is always potential for discovery. It's never too late. This knowledge should give man his greatest challenge - the pursuit of self - his own personal Odessey; discovering his rooms and putting them in order. It should challenge him not only to be a good person, a loving person, a feeling person, an intelligent person, but the best, most loving, feeling, intelligent person he is capable of. His search is not in competition with anyone else's. He becomes his own personal challenge.

Loving yourself involves the discovery of the true wonder of you; not only the present you, but the many possibilities of you. It involves the continual realization that you are unique, like no other person in the world, that life is, or should be, the discovery, the development and the sharing of this uniqueness. The process is not always easy, for one is bound to find those who will feel threatened by a changing, growing you. But it will always  be exciting, always be fresh and like all things new and changing, never be dull. The trip into oneself is the grandest, most enjoyable and longest lasting. The fare is cheap; it merely involves continual experiencing, evaluating, educating, trying out new behavior. Only you can be the final judge in determining what is right for you."

- Leo Buscaglia

Happy weekend...

Happy sunny Friday! This has been some week. Today is my last day of work with my current company, and I'm thrilled to be taking on a new challenge starting after Memorial Day! As Stanley Kunitz says in his famous poem "The Layers," "No doubt the next chapter / in my book of transformations / is already written. / I am not done with my changes." The next few days will be all about celebrating. I hope you have a glorious weekend!

• Listening to classic Beach Boys albums "Pet Sounds" in honor of the summer-like weather we've been having here in the Northeast. The record was released in May nearly fifty years ago.
• Adding these brilliant Chia seed packets to my daily smoothies for an extra hydrating and Omega-packed punch... all while preventing the typical scatter of tiny beads all over the countertop. Genius, really.
• Feeling mesmerized by Korean artist Kwangho Lee's exhibition entitled "Touch," which is comprised of the most lush looking cacti (an oxymoron, if I ever saw one) you've ever wanted to caress. Nature is amazing.
• And finally, a gorgeous poem on transformation from Rilke, that speaks volumes to finding purpose and peace in our ends and beginnings:

"Want the change. Be inspired by the flame
where everything shines as it disappears.
The artist, when sketching, loves nothing so much
as the curve of the body as it turns away.

What locks itself in sameness has congealed.
Is it safer to be gray and numb?
What turns hard becomes rigid
and is easily shattered.

Pour yourself out like a fountain.
Flow into the knowledge that what you are seeking
finishes often at the start, and, with ending, begins.

Every happiness is the child of a separation
it did not think it could survive. And Daphne, becoming
a laurel,
dares you to become the wind."

Happy weekend...

Happy Friday! It might be a day full of April showers, but this week was gorgeous otherwise. My sentiments on spring can be summed up by an elderly woman also waiting to cross at a corner, who proclaimed, to anyone with ears: "Here we are! And none of us ever thought we'd get to be out here again." You are so right, sister.

Wishing you a weekend of sunshine, noticeable newness, and Friluftsliv. Before we get to it, here are a few links that moved my week:

• Vibing the new Jamie xx jam "Loud Places" hard. In the gym, on the streets, in my head.
• Dabbling in watercolor painting, as I dream up some pretty things for our wedding and reduce a little stress by creating with my hands.
• Loving David Brook's Op-Ed "The Moral Bucket List," particularly the bit where he talks about how those who radiate inner light "do not find their vocations by asking, what do I want from life? They ask, what is life asking of me? How can I match my intrinsic talent with one of the world’s deep needs?" Beautiful.
• And finally, a quote from Parker Palmer's essay on the poem "Thanks, Robert Frost":

“The past isn’t fixed and frozen in place. Instead, its meaning changes as life unfolds. I once lost a job. At the time, it felt as if I had come to the end of the road. But after a while, I was able to see how that loss helped guide me toward my true life-work. Losing that job was a blessing, not a curse.

I’ve made many mistakes and often failed to live up to my aspirations, but I don’t need to look back with regret. Instead, I can see all of my mess-ups as humus or compost for the growing I needed to do.

I love the fact that the word “humus” is related to “humility.” The good I do today may well have its roots in something not-so-good I did in the past. Knowing that takes me beyond both the sinkhole of regret and the hot-air balloon of pride.

Regret shuts life down. Humility opens it up.”

— Parker Palmer

Damien Jurado at Brighton Music Hall

“There’s always someone affirming the significance of a song by taking a woman into his arms or by getting through the night. That’s what dignifies the song. Songs don’t dignify human activity. Human activity dignifies the song.”

— Leonard Cohen

Last summer, I became enamored with a set of songs - a paradox in sounds. Guitar chords that were stripped down, yet drumming with vibrations. An honest voice that reverberated between a haunting falsetto and a cry in the darkness. A production that somehow balanced feeling intimate with the echo of a thousand voices falling from space. 

It also didn't hurt that the new album was sprung from a dream about a guy who gets lost in the desert.

I was getting lost myself, at the time, and feeling a bit lost too. I was spending a little too long up in the air, splitting weeks between homes and feeling a general sense of vulnerability that comes with being ungrounded.

In times where balance is tested, I believe in being gentle on oneself. I also believe that art can help too.

And so, whenever I landed from my weekly flights, I'd come back to a New York City apartment that was still mine- the last standing bastion of a solitary life in transition. I'd light candles and open the windows wide, to let in the warm summer air that I missed while moving through various vestibules of artificial air. I would lie on the cold wood floor, press play on Damien Jurado's Brothers and Sisters of the Eternal Son, and feel grounded - in myself, in my current space, in the now. And over time, I began to grasp an awareness that external circumstances remain just so unless we shift perspective and see them not as the enemy, but as parts of our story in time.

On Friday, I found myself time-traveling back to that space through Damien Jurado's performance at Brighton Music Hall.

It was a small, intimate crowd, donning snow-boots, sweaters, and a connection to these sounds for reasons - unique, every one.  Acoustic versions of songs, like "Museum from Flight" and "Working Titles" from his earlier Richard Swift-produced albums, Maraqopa and Saint Bartlett, recounted earlier incarnations inspired by that mythical dream. These tracks were juxtaposed by the psychedelic visions and cosmic mysteries presented in Brothers and Sisters, and self-deprecating commentary by a typically warbling Jurado himself. 

The crowd swayed to "Silver Timothy", laughed as Jurado stumbled his way through "Ohio", and I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that I let myself be overwhelmed by emotion. Standing in the glow of a musician whose music was made meaningful, who helped move me to a place of peace - in a time where there was peace to be found -  felt like a warm embrace. And doing so, on the other side of that particular life transition, made the moment even more bittersweet. 

This wasn't the first time that I've found solace in sounds borne into my life at the right time. Music is a powerful energy, and one that disregards the onward beat of time. It can stir a memory or even trigger a change. But the key is, it move us, and if we're lucky, it does so back to a place of balance, so we can eventually move forward and press play.

(Photo by Terrance Doyle)