Small Wonders Archives - Page 7 of 8

Sigh, Sigh, Sigh (& Stay Alive!)

Sigh … audibly. Deeply. Frequently. (So says my fitness instructor)

Dreamer’s latest angiogram date looms. After 5 bypasses, why are we here again? Dismay feels substantive enough to mold—like river sludge between cupped palms.

Sigh. Empty the hands, lift them in trusting surrender.

An audible sigh re-inflates the vital, occasionally squashed alveoli within our lungs, keeping us alive.

So sigh some more.

A sigh alleviates stress. Research shows that 12 hourly sighs help us regroup, emotionally. Read more here.

Yes, bad news strikes, and fear makes us bristle, become thistle-y with those we love
Yes, sometimes even the air weighs on us, seemingly saturated with unshed tears
Yes, how easily we slide toward the sump of dread

Stalled out again,
going nowhere fast,
I remember “nowhere”
plus the addition
of one slender space
becomes “now here.”

Presence. One slender pause—a breath, a hum, a prayer—invites a sacred recalibration. The built-in reset for body and soul.

Inhale. Sigh aloud. Repeat.

“there is a changing of everything —
when breath becomes prayer.”*

Richard Rohr teaches a simple breath prayer. Using the name YAHWEH for God: inhale, audibly voicing the YAH; exhale, audibly voicing the WEH.

I also like Dr. Andrew’s Weil’s calming breath exercise:

Exhale as much air as possible with a big whoosh
Place tongue behind upper teeth, inhale for an easy count of 4
Hold breath for a count of 7
Exhale audibly for a count of 8

Do this four times. As it becomes easier, increase to eight repetitions, twice a day.

I vary the 4-7-8 exercise by counting on my fingers, simultaneously humming or praying.

*Prayer, Ann Voskamp

Breaking In

by Laurie Klein 37 Chiming In

Breaking in sounds so … criminal.

Unless it’s light breaking in, or insight, or a penetrating sense of hope.

February 1973, public restroom, Hawaii:

Pre-Luau, six friends wash up. Judy sings Ju – bi – late Deo (rejoice in God). We all chime in. Great acoustics, a 15th-century round—we sound like a choir in a soaring cathedral.

Later the luau bandleader says, into the mic, “We heard heavenly music … coming from the ladies’ room.”

(laughter)

We slide down in our seats.

“Would those angels please join us onstage?”

(crowd, rubbernecking, applauds).

“Everyone should hear you,” he adds.

Before an international audience we sing and sing—in Latin. The long-dead language rising, rising.

We finish. A person could hear a lei petal drop.

“We sing. Things become fresh,” Walter Brueggermann writes.

“But then the moment breaks.”

In this half-broken world “a song’s always breaking in,” my friend Barb says.

Listen for it.

And sometimes, be one.

When have you heard the sound of hope breaking in? What happened?

For us there was no birth cry,
the newborn bird is suddenly here,
the egg broken, the nest alive,
and we heard nothing when the world changed.

—Lisel Mueller (excerpt), “What the Dog Perhaps Hears”

Hear “Jubilate Deo” here: 15th century round, or perpetual canon, written by Michael Praetorious.

Hinge Points: Relative Movement

by Laurie Klein 17 Chiming In

Hinge point: It’s my blog’s 2 1/2 year mark. I’m trying something new. Let me know what you think?

Introducing . . . ONE-MINUTE WONDERS:

1 snapshot
100-some words
1 minute of your time

Hinge: A flexible point of connection that allows relative movement.

Hinges squeal. Our old rattle-scrap screen door heaves and judders.

His sleeve cinched between door and jamb, the kid roars: “Let. Me. Go-o-o-o!”

He’s livid. And bigger than me. He’ll punch through the mesh any second. Then kill me. And then it’ll be me, the girl memorialized in the family album viewed with sighs, and shaken heads. “Always the stubborn one.”

Still, I’m leaning backward now, death-gripping cloth, white-knuckling the knob. Sweaty, panting, we glare at each other.

He’s my brother. We share a genetic axis. We are self-contained yet revolve around each other.

Who will pivot?

“You’re such a—” My scathing comeback erupts into hiccups. He snickers.

Despite anger’s corrosion, its grinding wear-and-tear . . .

. . . laughing, I open the door.

Sooner or later, everything hinges on grace.

Mirth diffuses defiance. How has unexpected humor released you?

You might also enjoy: Amazing Grace: Cyber Refresh

And for a genius-in-motion, world-class hinge: watch the Burke Brise Soleil, Milwaukee Art Museum (1:00)

Read about rear-pivot hydraulic cylinders and rod-eye hinges here.

Love and the Stork’s Apprentice

by Laurie Klein 18 Chiming In

Some stories are so tender, they’re meant for only a few eyes. This story reveals hard things, and hopes long-guarded. I’ve covered the heroes so you can see their goodness, but they won’t feel the world’s glare in their faces. I trust you to do the same.

###

Can a young, single, entrepreneurial girl be almost full-term—and not know it?

Let’s call her Larkin: Girl-on-the-move, literally and figuratively, traveling across country with a new boyfriend. Unexplained pain prompts their detour to our city’s Emergency Room. [Read more…]

With or Without a Net

by Laurie Klein 8 Chiming In

Is today a good time for a walk where you live? If not, how about taking a virtual walk with me?

Wild, sometimes, the memories that surface.
You step out the door
and before you know it . . .

you’re a hatless kid again, let loose in the meadow, stalking ladybugs, moths and monarchs. In spongy-new tennies, you inch past milkweeds and burdock, dandelions and Queen Anne’s lace.

If you relished this mid-century childhood freedom like I did, half the fun was being outside on your own, green grapes in a pocket, traveling with or without a net for butterflies (made with a coat hanger and cheesecloth). Remember? Let’s go!

Exploring. Staring at clouds.
Sitting on our haunches to flip over a bug with a stick.
Whistling on grass blades, inhaling May.

Walking without a net today, I take these pictures along the path and wonder (maybe you do, too):

Why do I always prefer a safety net?

I don’t like living without a net to catch me. Before I can plumb this fear, I see the wild shooting stars: tall and delicate with wind tunnel petals. Their centers are dark, beaky snouts.

Their name alone reminds me to watch for surprises.

“If you search for the little bursts of surprise in your life,” writes Margaret Moore, “you create an entire mind-set change—exactly what the adventurer needs.”*

I’m not very adventurous. But I’d like to be.

Streamline this soul today
like a badminton birdie,
ready to rise . . .

“Finding novel sensations in the everyday hits a mental reset button,” says Todd Kashdan, PhD.**

And you—what of your rushed
and useful life? Imagine setting it all down—
papers, plans, appointments, everything—
leaving only a note: “gone
to the fields to be lovely. Be back
when I’m through with blooming.”

—Lynn Ungar, “Camas Lilies”

This is my year to delight more in life—without a net of some kind to reassure me I’ll be okay. Sometimes I question my motives. I take heart from the following quote:

“An adventurous person will always have moments of feeling like a fraud—it’s a sign that you’re creating new roles for yourself, that you’re evolving. It means you’re doing great, passionate work (Kashdan).”

Grass widow and the wheel done rolling — Wild Larkspur

So today, if we feel more like a wheel done rolling . . .

Larkspur, you remind us to keep seeking
the company of those who are still blooming,
as if knowing some days we feel
irrelevant, relegated to rust.

Or is it field art?

TAKING IT FURTHER:

Amble somewhere this week. Make this outing non-aerobic. Non-wired. A slow roam without a net, soul mesh open to receive surprise. What along the speaks to you? How might this change the way you live?

*Margaret Moore, MacLean/Harvard Institute of Coaching, as quoted in O, June 2010, p. 141.
**Todd Kashdan, PhD, author of Curious?
“Camas Lilies,” Lynn Ungar, Bread and Other Miracles