Freshly Grounded
Where are you finding your sources of mental, emotional, and spiritual health, friends?
This week, I found a tiny story from Gregory Boyle in his book Cherished Belonging of a time he was walking down the sidewalk in New York City when he heard a man yelling to his friend about his coffee preference. “Freshly…Grounded…Turkish…Cawfee!” Multiple times, the same line: “Freshly…Grounded…Turkish…Cawfee.” And from this, Boyle finds a mantra. “Freshly grounded” starts to repeat itself and suddenly, Boyles says, this is all he wants: “To be freshly grounded in endless, oceanic love.”
And then it became a mantra for me. For the rest of the week, each morning I considered, how might I be ‘freshly grounded’ today, or even right at this one singular moment?
When we’re grounded we can be an anchor for others. It’s the most true and important thing I know how to do right now, to be freshly grounded, not once but each day. This is a daily grind, pardon the pun.
How might this be possible these days?
This week, I was deeply thankful for yoga class moments that grounded me in community, for the practices I’ve stored in the “freezer” that ground me in my body for just these kind of times, for poetry that grounded me in my heart. So I’ll keep this simple and short, friends, and end by sharing one of the poems that ignited my heart, as well as a new yoga practice.
It’s a simple mantra, friends: freshly grounded. May it serve you somehow in these days ahead.
Even in a Time of Intolerance, by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer “We all have a part in shifting the story.” —Joy Harjo, 23rd US Poet Laureate There is, in an overfull classroom, a woman teaching not only history, but compassion. There’s a barista making hearts in the foam of every cappuccino she serves. There’s man helping another man on crutches as he struggles to cross the icy street. There’s a library room full of women chanting about praying for their enemy. There are students raising money to help those with breast cancer and AIDS. Two girls are laughing for the joy of laughing ’til their faces are tear-streaked and their ribs and bellies are sore. There’s a poet who pours courage and music into every word she shares with the world. And another woman hears those words and thinks, “Me. That poet is talking to me.” This is how we change the world one kind act, one true word, one long laugh at a time. Because now, that woman is ablaze with wondering: What is my part in shifting the story?
And finally some yoga: Adaptable Yoga w/Christa