Ruah Bull - Spiritual Director

 It is as if what is unbreakable - The very pulse of life- waits for everything else to be torn away, and then in that bareness that only silence and suffering and  great love can expose, it dares  to speak through us and to us. It seems to say, if you want to last, hold on to nothing. If you want to love, let in everything. If you want to feel the presence of everything, stop counting the things that break along the way.

 I know this happiness is provisional: the looming presences- great suffering, great fear- withdraw only into peripheral vision: but ineluctable this shimmering of wind in the blue leaves: this flood of stillness widening the lake of sky: this need to dance, this need to kneel: this mystery

 Have compassion for everyone you meet,  even if they don't want it, What seems conceit, bad manners or cynicism is always a sign of things no ears have heard, no eyes have seen. You do not know what wars are going on down there where the spirit meets the bone.

 It's as if what is unbreakable - the very pulse of life- waits for everything else to be torn away, and then in the bareness that only silence and suffering and great love can expose, it dares to speak through us and to us. it seems to say, if you want to last, hold on to nothing. if you want to know love, let in everything. if you want to feel the presence of everything, stop counting the  things that break along the way.

 We are emptiness like hollow in the reed, the narrow riftless emptiness which can have only one destiny: to  utter the song that is in the piper's heart. ... The reed grows by the stream. It is the simplest of things, but it must be cut by a sharp knife, hollowed out, stops put in it. It must be shaped and pierced before it can utter the shepherd's song. It is the narrowest emptiness in the world, but the little reed utters God's infinite music. We are lifted up and carved out, formed and shaped and filled with all the music of the earth.

 Mother of Mercy, the cries of the world keep me up at night. I rise from my bed, but I cannot locate the source of the wailing. It is everywhere, Mother, coming from all directions, and my heart is shattered by the sheer intensity of suffering. You of boundless compassion, expand my heart so that I can contain the pain. Focus my mind so that I can arrive at viable solutions, and energize my body so I can engage in effective action. Give me courage to follow the crumbs of heartbreak all the way home to the place where I can be of real service. Let me dip my fingers into the dew of your compassion and scatter it now over the fevered brow of this world.

 I've broken through to longing Now, filled with grief I have  felt before, but never like this. The center leads to love. Soul opens the creations' core. Hold on to your particular pain. That too can take you to God,

  The mystics warn that you are bound to be nicked by the barbs of existence.  The soul's well-being is not dependent on safety, but meaning... Hold the mystical crumbs in your mouth. Taste Beauty in every step. Stay awake... Sing songs of mercy along the way... The pangs of loneliness will be piercing... With practice a fierce compassion Swells from this barefoot vulnerability. Embrace each kindred traveler you meet, for only the walking and wordling souls abide and enlarge in the midst of such relentless change.

Thank You for letting me live for a little while as one of the sane; thank You for letting me know what this is  like. Thank You for letting me look at your frightening blue sky without fear and your terrible world without  terror, and Your loveless psychotic and hopelessly lost with this love.

Oh Lord, remember not only the men and women of good will, but also those of ill will. But do not remember all the suffering they inflicted on us; Remember the fruits we have bought, thanks to the suffering - our comradeship,our loyalty, our humility, our courage,our generosity, the greatness of heart which has grown out of all of this. And when they come to judgement, let all the fruits which we have born be their forgiveness.

to love life, to love it even when you have no stomach for it and everything you've held dear crumbles like burnt paper in your hands, your throat filled with the silt of it. When grief sits with you, its tropical heat thickening the air, heavy as water more fit for gills that lungs; when grief weights you like your own flesh only more of it, an obesity of grief, you think, How can a body withstand this? Then you hold life like a face between your palms, a plain face, no charming smile, no violet eyes, and you say, yes, I will take you I will love you, again.