Widening Circles

“I live my life in widening circles That reach across the world.” -----Rainer Maria Rilke I want to live my life in awareness of its widening circles: • Each day, the turning of the earth, the rising and setting of the sun, honoring the varying qualities and gifts of light and darkness. • Each week, a day of Sabbath rest when I release the world’s hold on me. • Every four weeks, the moon moving through her cycle, growing into fullness, before her gentle waning until she disappears for a night into blackness… • Every four months, the turning of the seasons and the slow movement to a new way of being in the world… • Each year, remembering the day of my birth and the birth of all those I love. I give special honor to my commitments in life, and the days that recall great losses in my life. • Every seven years, the changing of each cell in the body, and we are made completely new… and then there is the largest personal cycle----- • A lifetime. My own life will fall into the great beyond, a rhythm that is not predictable or solid like the turning of the earth. I am only sure it will happen and I give myself to it. In that giving I receive a life filled with blessing. --------Christine Valters Paintner “The Artist’s Rule”