Idle and Blessed

I think God wants us to walk in the rain sometimes without an umbrella. Let our skin get cold after a long hot summer. Feel a part of the elements of the earth, covered in them, breathing them in like mist or an inhaler. I think it involves surrender and simplicity because your hair gets wet and clothes stick to skin, and it's hard to keep your eyes fully open to see. I think God wants us to watch the sun wake up some mornings and realize how fast it happens. Watch how the night flees from it. Let it teach us something about waking. -JAY

I wrote recently about my inkling that running could be prayer. Like anything that unites body, mind, and spirit under one intention, it brings a meditativeness that goes straight to the core of us. I know running is prayer because I am my most generous self out there. By generous I mean my heart is open to people; I mean my heart chooses to think the best of people. You know that feeling when you drive down I-285 in the traffic and suddenly you realize these people probably all had long days too? Or when someone flips out on you at work and you notice it's just been too way long since they took a yoga class? That feeling is generosity. Your soul is making enough space for theirs. And when I run, about four miles in, I feel this generosity and thankfulness and love toward the people in my life and I think up extravagant ways to thank them. I wish I followed through more, really. I always think I solve the world's problems on runs and then promptly forget. Anyway, I know r...

A story is like water that you heat for your bath. It takes messages between the fire and your skin. It lets them meet, and it cleans you! Very few can sit down in the middle of the fire itself like a salamander or Abraham. We need intermediaries. A feeling of fullness comes, but usually it takes some bread to bring it. Beauty surrounds us, but usually we need to be walking in a garden to know it. The body itself is a screen to shield and partially reveal the light that's blazing inside your presence. Water, stories, the body, all the things we do, are mediums that hide and show what's hidden. Study them, and enjoy this being washed with a secret we sometimes know, and then not. Rumi