Feel like you’re ready for a change in later life?
Have something no longer life giving
you want to put behind you?
Want to open up space and unleash positive energy for a new chapter in your life?
Here’s a short video about a rite of passage I took at Ghost Ranch recently you might want to consider.
A caring relationship with Mother Earth can lead to significant changes in the way we live on the land not off the land.
Music, poetry and creative writing can be helpful tools for wellness.
Writing for Wellness
In my first collection of poems “Out from the Shadows: Poetic Portraits of Faith”, published in 2007, I give expression to a faith journey through the dark valley of a midlife crisis.
In “Peach, Limestone, and Green”, published after my first wife Denise died, I share letters and poems I wrote on my journey through loss and grief. While I both embraced and pushed back from sources of comfort along the way, I was touched by grace time and again which empowered me to continue with hope, my creative writing helping to heal and harvest wisdom for growth and maturity.
With “Called to be Alive!” I have turned again to the practice of creative writing together with other contemplative arts like lectio divina, journaling, music, meditation, and forest bathing to help do the inner work necessary for me to navigate from midlife to elderhood. Deciding not to merely drift into my older years, I have embraced aging as a spiritual practice by which I gain enlightenment and am enlivened for purposeful living. As a conscious elder, I am open and responsive to the promptings of Spirit, meaningfully engaged in the completion of my life on earth.
Call to Write Poetry
Anything is subject for a poem. Any time is occasion for writing a poem. A wise person who wants to be enlivened and enlightened by the Spirit of Life will do well to cultivate the poet in themselves.
See excerpt from 365 Tao below:
Choose Words that Are Life-giving
Create Positive Change Through Your Words
Choose to be more conscious, putting to rest words and phrases that are outmoded, insensitive, or harmful. Choosing words that are life-giving.
All we have to do is choose to be more conscious, putting to rest words and phrases that are outmoded, insensitive, or harmful. We can also exercise our creativity by creating new phrases that carry positive and loving energy to replace the old ones.
You may already have some ideas about phrases you’d like to transition out of your language, and now that you’re thinking about it, you may come across many more. As you consciously decide not to use these phrases, you may feel lighter and more joyful, knowing that you have chosen to drop baggage that was handed down to you from a less conscious time. As you do so, you elevate the language for future generations who would no doubt thank you if they could.
See entire OM article:
The Celtic name for a spiritual director is Anam Cara which means soul friend.
There is a dangerous uprising I can no longer ignore.
Plastic is mounting a deadly attack and I feel called to see beyond the foolishness of this predicament for ways I can help save our planet.
So I am more mindful now of my use of plastic,
wiser about its hidden dangers, and I have begun to do my part in helping reduce, recycle, and reuse.
Hard to find in the stores where we typically buy groceries and toiletries, I recently purchased silk dental floss. Granted a small thing in literally a sea filled with wave after wave of plastic around the globe, but it’s something nonetheless, and every time I floss it reminds me to seek eco-friendly alternatives.
Earth Day on April 22nd reminds us that care for the earth is something we are called to do every day of the year. And while responsible use of plastic is a very complicated issue, it can be as easy as flossing with silk.
Home
I picked an apple today
and dreamed of an orchard that I might call home
Then at the close of my morning devotions
holding the ripe apple in the aging of my palm,
I realized
home is where I rest
in the ageless hand of the maker
In a deep, calm seeing my place is secure in the presence of God and the world becomes safe and enchanted.
Seems the best in life is often not fully lived until we stand to loss it. Like my Grandpa John’s loss of the family orchard in the Great Depression, climate change today is stirring hearts throughout the human family with a longing to re-establish a healthy relationship with Mother Earth.
Some time ago I returned to my Grandpa John’s orchard country in Virginia and found one of his apple crate labels hanging in a fruit stand. Today just feeling an apple in the palm of my hand has a way of making the whole world kin.
What touch of nature moves your relationship with the earth toward intimacy and respect?
Many have told me they appreciate the encouraging words I write and often post. I humbly accept the affirmation giving thanks for the opportunity to share light and love.
There is another reason I write. Stress skews my perception of self, others, and the world debilitating me and sabotaging my best intentions. Thoughts are heavy and can come unhinged. By letting them out on paper I decrease my mental mass and lessen the grip these distortions have on me.
Along with journaling I have found writing songs and short poems help life flow in and through me contributing, if but a speck of illuminated stardust, hope, joy, and peace that benefit others and our planet nonetheless.
Taking my Uke on the road today
To memory care residents alive near the sea
Who welcome me to sing and play
And who help me remember the best yet to be
Below is an email sent to me by a friend who had just listened to my song Apple Cider Blues featuring a tenor ukulele:
“I believe that the UKE is the most inherently subversive musical instrument out there. Most folks come to the Uke’s music with a preconceived idea of what they’re getting and that idea is usually derived from someone plunking around on a cheap souvenir model. That is why, in my opinion, when it is played with passion and emotion it can have a great effect as it is unexpected.
The UKE is also inherently subversive due to its light and welcoming sound. One could do covers of even metal or rap and folks who would not normally give those songs the time of day would give it a listen.
Finally, given the inherent accessibility of the instrument, the topic range of the lyrics is wide open. Crass becomes charming, preachy becomes whimsical. For your Apple Cider Blues song, it takes what is typically a slow paced metered and flat noted genre and tilts it into what would be referenced as an uplifting gospel song.”
-Tom Shannon, Hammond, Oregon
Yes, what Tom says about the ukulele is in my experience very true. When played with passion a charming little ukulele can move mountains. Just think for example, the power of IZ (Israel Kamakawiwoole) who played on his tiny uke moving millions of hearts around the world while fueling the grass root movement for social change in Hawaii.
To listen to my song “Apple Cider Blues” just click the YouTube icon below or go to https://www.youtube.com/c/jerryoneill.
For a wonderful in-depth resource about the ukulele look up The Ukulele~ A History written by Jim Tranquada and John King, University of Hawaii Press 2012.
