The Wonderworker

Drink water from the spring where horses drink — the horse will never drink bad water.
Lay your bed where the cat sleeps.
Eat the fruit that has been touched by a worm.
Boldly pick the mushroom on which the insects sit.
Plant the tree where the mole digs.
Dig your fountain where the birds hide from heat.
Go to sleep and wake up at the same time with the birds – you will reap all of the days golden grains.
Eat more green – you will have strong legs and a resistant heart, like the beings of the forest.
Swim often and you will feel on earth like the fish in the water.
Look at the sky as often as possible and your thoughts will become light and clear.
Be quiet a lot, speak little – and silence will come in your heart, and your spirit will be calm and full of peace.

– Saint Seraphim of Sarov (The Wonderworker)

Shifting Perspectives

The world seemed cruel
Except in the evening
When the moon greeted me

©️2023 MW 🙏

Can you trust your instincts, gut knowingness and intuition?

Connecting Empathic Helpers & Artists to Spirit

Many in the spiritual community, including myself, encourage others to trust their instincts, gut knowingness, or intuition. Even though these terms are often talked about, some people don’t know what each term means. First, let’s start with some definitions.

Instinct is a survival mechanism built into every human and animal being. It is an impulse that senses, often without reason, that something is wrong and propels you to fight, flight or freeze. This is associated with your first chakra.

Gut knowingness is a feeling in your gut. Did you know you have a second brain? There are brain cells in our digestive system, just like our brain. It makes sense when someone says the expression, go with your gut. Tune into your digestive system, what is it telling you about a person, place or thing? This is associated with your second and third chakra.

Intuition is a sixth sense. A…

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What is an Ambiguous Loss?

Connecting Empathic Helpers & Artists to Spirit

An ambiguous loss occurs when a relationship or connection that was significant to you ends, without a clear understanding or closure. “Ambiguous loss is a loss that remains unclear. The premise of the ambiguous loss theory is that uncertainty or a lack of information about the whereabouts or status of a loved one as absent or present, as dead or alive, is traumatizing for most individuals, couples, and families”(Boss, 2007).

Since, the details of the loss remain unknown, it is this uncertainty which prolongs the grieving process. You are left wondering, do I continue to hold on or let go? Many people hold out hope that the relationship or connection will return to normal, while others begin the letting go process.

A Disenfranchised Grief

Since this is not a clear cut type of loss, such as when a person dies from an illness, many in society do not consider these…

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Moment to Moment

Moment to moment
In this wasted land
The trees still rise to greet the sun and the moon

In every untenable moment
Lives a parallel moment
Where the rivers still flow
The birds still sing
The flowers still bloom

When tenderness and harshness collide
In this wasted land
The rivers still flow
The birds still sing
The flowers still bloom
The trees still rise to greet the sun and the moon
Moment to moment

---

© 2022 MW

For David’s Wea’ve Written Weekly (W3) poetry prompt on Skeptic’s Kaddish. Kerf Roig is our prompt poet this week. Guidelines: Responsive poem. 16 lines or less. Must start and end with the same line.

Looking Up or Down During Conversations

Many view looking up or down during conversations as a negative reflection on people who don’t maintain direct eye contact.

I want to put forth some non-judgmental and positive reasons why this happens.

1. More oxygen flows to the brain when the head is tilted back due to elongation of the breathing track, and increased blood flow where it is needed in the back of the head and neck area, where there is a build up of stress and strain.

Looking upward is a Yogic breathing technique aimed at “expansion of mind.”

Although we might not be consciously aware of why we are doing it, it is a physiological response with a beneficial purpose.

2. People of faith often lift their gaze while praying. The upward gaze can be a subconscious way of asking Godde for help during an emotionally fraught or difficult conversation.

3. When we contemplate and think deeply the energy is concentrated in our brain and head region. Looking upward towards that energy, naturally increases concentration.

4. People with sensory sensitivity can be overwhelmed by other people in the room, colors, mannerisms, lights, sounds and movement. Looking away or down helps to focus and cope with sensory overload.

5. Looking down or away may indicate the other person is embarrassed by the subject matter.

6. Neurodiverse people often find it difficult and uncomfortable to maintain direct eye contact.

Most of us are just doing the best we can to get through this process of being human.

May we all be less judgmental and more aware of our humanness when communicating with others.

© MW 🙏

Meeting With God

I met with god under the weeping willow tree
She was playing in the shadows
Where a blackbird 
Suddenly burst forth into the sky
In a flurry of wings

© 2021 🙏

Grapes In My Past

There were grapes in my past
Fragrant vineyards
Crates of purple velvet
Pickers spinning yarns
Beneath the white hot sun

There were grapes in my past
A vigneron singing
Ardent planting and harvesting
A legacy of pleasure and pain
Connecting my ancestors 
To the nectar of the God
Bringing abundance
Fertility
Transformation
Good luck

There were fields in my past
Fertile soil
Alive with potential
Bountiful and hand-picked
Dust and grain
Olive skin
Stones with memories among the rows
Day after day
Plowing the fields
Sun-drunk and callused
Scythes swinging
Servitude by season
Benevolent harvest
God is in the dirt
Destined from birth
Closer to heaven
Through the earth

© 2021

Before There Was One God

Before there was one God,
God was an ewe in labor…
A rain cloud
A life form
The warm sun on the horizon
An orchard in bloom

Before there was one God,
God was a mantra…
A deed
An unplowed field
A thought in progress
A cluster of stars
A gurgling stream
Laughing, chanting
Twirling, dancing
Moonlight shimmering
Whispering, whispering, whispering
Love, love!
Beloved, Beloved!
You are my gardener
I am your seed
You are my bud
I am your tree

I am the flower
You are the bee

2021 MW 🙏

Kundalini

She is the pining in your belly,
She is the unease knocking at your door
She is the questioning,
She is the longing,
She is the surge and the pulse,
She is the rhythmic drum beat
Of knowledge and ignorance,
Way down in the recesses
Of your soul.

She is the seeds of wisdom,
Hungering to be sown.

© 2021 MW 🙏

Kundalini – the original

The Space

I am the space between can be and is. 

I am the space between is and can be. 

I am the space. 

© 2021 MW 🙏

Names

I didn’t know the names of the souls standing before me,
The flowers only knew the names of the bees,
The rocks only knew the names of the leaves,
The bluebird only knew the name of the breeze,
All the names are clouded in mystery,
I’m not sure who I am,

I am unfinished.
I am unrecognizable.  
I am unseen.

The face that you see,
That stranger in the mirror,
Is not me.

Perhaps I am only a figment.
Perhaps I am only a whisper.
Perhaps I am only a passing fancy.
Perhaps I am only wishful thinking.
Perhaps I am a soul that took a wrong turn,
On the way to eternity.

Perhaps I am a jagged stone,
Thrown into the rushing waters,
Where the river and the sand,
Will pummel and polish me smooth,
Eroding all my uneven edges,
As it courses around me.

[Perhaps someone will make a stone sculpture,
Out of the smoothed out version,
It is more acceptable to be]

©️2021 / Love is all…MW 🙏

Is God Here?

Is God here in the wild lands
Where the ache of abandonment begins
And the blueness of the sky ends? 

Is God here in the rubble
And deserted grandeur
Of this ancient life that I live?

Is God here where I stumbled
Where I fell wearily
Where the rain is my only companion?

Is God here where I dance
With the specters of magnificence
Untouched by human hands?

Is God here where the stardust whispers
And the sweet gray clouds
Lay like a cloak upon my skin?

Is God here where the earth is cracked
Under the weight of heaven
Highlighting my broken places within? 

Beloved, Beloved, Beloved!
I call upon your Name
Swirling through the windstorm
The blizzard
The tempest of shame

©️2021 / Love is all…MW 🙏

May I…

May my behavior today express my deepest beliefs.

May I approach each and every task today with quiet impeccability.

May I be a simple, humble and kind presence on the earth today.

May I be grateful today to those who came before me.

May I make the roads smoother for those who will travel them after me.

May I leave each place at least a little better than I found it today.

May I truly cherish this day, knowing that it may be my last.

May I remember, remember, remember, not to forget, forget, forget.

“It’s a Meaningful Life: It Just Takes Practice” 

Note To Self II

Beloved One,

I am writing this letter to reaffirm my love for you, as a keepsake for you to cherish, and as a reminder of my commitment to your happiness.

In moments of extreme frustration, I have questioned my love for you, I have doubted your worth and I have hurt you countless times with my words and actions.

I deeply apologize for the pain I’ve inflicted upon you and ask for your forgiveness. I have buried you when trying to escape the pain. Please know I am holding space for your pilgrimage to wholeness, even when I feel broken.

---

Love is all…MW

©️2021 🙏

Integration

The small streams

Are merging into the big river

Mind pollution

Is left to dry up in the cleansing sun

Now that you’ve silenced the cacophony of voices

Dipped in poison

Your integration has begun

---

©️2021 MW 🙏

1001 Steps

I believe in your love. 
I believe in your dreams.
I believe in your joy.
I believe in your sorrow.
I believe in you.
With every step you breathe your presence into existence. 
They say the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step,
You are on step one thousand and one,
No one warned you about the next step,
That’s the one that sends you flying,
Falling, falling onto the footpath of the unknown,
I see monsters and faeries in the distance.

---

©️2021 MW 🙏

Water

Water flows on a daily basis.

She is a still life resuscitated without consent.

The river flows with a purpose,

Her mind is a kaleidoscope of harried thoughts.

She is alone in her travels,

The ground shifting beneath her feet, 

Wind roughing up the trees,

Stones heavy upon the earth.

She has no destination,

No people, no one to applaud her steps.

She looks to the sky as the sun settles into the horizon,

A breeze raising goosebumps on her skin…

The flow of the water has shifted,

Perhaps she will find or lose her footing,

On the footbridge to everywhere and nowhere,

On the walk without end.

She sleeps upon the icy imprints of death marches,

She doesn’t know if she’s marching towards life,

Or closer to the edge of death.

---

©️2021 MW. I had a dream I was walking across a bridge with no end in sight, bereft to the marrow of my bones, with the wind blowing through me and the water flowing and churning beneath. In my dream, I felt the presence of my great-grandparents and grandparents, who survived the czarist and nazi pogroms.