Surrender, Dedication and Gratitude

Every moment life offers us the opportunity to learn something, every moment it gives us signs and hints....

It is up to us to be awake and to keep our senses perceptive. How do we use this precious gift of hearing... of seeing... of touching... these gates of perception?

Are we open to the message of the Divine that surrounds us everywhere?

Or do we allow our senses to be taken over by media messages of fear?

Are we wasting our life force on entertaining effects and pleasures that are "offered" to us around the clock, preventing us from becoming still, distracting us from looking deeper, listening more finely, hearing the symphony of life....and recognizing our place in it.

The singing of birds, the daily blossoming and withering of magnificent flowers, the scent of meadow herbs, the colors of the sky at sunset, the sound of a waterfall.... Everything can remind us of the lavish abundance, the generosity of life, of the irrepressible joy and lightheartedness inherent in every moment....

Becoming and passing take place in every moment. Everything has its glorious moment of performance and is then ready to leave the stage again.... everything is ready to be part of a symphony...

And every note has its exact time of setting in. Some notes sound longer, some very short, some loud, some soft.... all these nuances make the beauty and genius....

Sometimes it seems as if the human being is this one note, which is not ready to fade away, which drowns out everything else, which resists to fall silent, which is not able to blend itself into the symphony of becoming and fading away.

As I wrote to you in my last newsletter, I am here in the Ionian Islands with a mission. I am following my heart's vision. I am looking for a place. Short term, I want to find a center suitable for a retreat in the near future.

Long term, I dream of a place that will allow for yoga practice with the elements, nature, the sun and the moon. Where the soul remembers its home.

There are days when things seem to fall right into place, and others when everything seems to close up....

Sometimes it's burdensome and I see what all the things that could be better: an off-road car would be helpful, speaking Greek would be necessary, more time, a bigger budget....

And on other days I am infinitely grateful to have a car at all, a budget at all...to be able to be here at all.... to be supported by many dear people, without whom this would not be possible at all.

The art is to surrender to the pulse of life. I am learning to fully experience the moment, in gratitude for what is now.

I do not know what will come next and trust that the next step will be shown to me. I give my full effort and do what I can, always reminding myself to let go of the expectation of a certain outcome.

It is a paradox. Our vision must be crystal clear and our willingness to follow it uncompromising. But what the Divine has ordained for us is not in our hands.

The art is to live in trust and surrender, always letting go of....expectations, disappointments, successes, failures....willing to humble ourselves...

And to resonate with the greater symphony of life....