Category Archives: Mary Oliver

Something Good

Image from this morning's walk. Spring in Colorado can be confusing...

Image from this morning’s walk. Spring in Colorado can be confusing…

1. Rearranged from Kat McNally. Like I told her, she’s half way around the world and the details of her daily life are so different, but ever since I discovered her, I’ve felt like she’s my mirror. And this, the idea of being “rearranged” feels so spot on. Dear Universe, I don’t care how you arrange it, but please let me be able to one day tell Kat to her sweet face how much I adore her. Love you. Love, Me.

2. 100 questions to inspire rapid self-discovery . . . . . . (and spark your next talk, date, blog post or book.) from Alexandra Franzen.

3. What I Wish I Knew Before Becoming A Yoga Teacher on MindBodyGreen.

4. Thoughts on HugDug and “Don’t do what I said, do what I meant” from Seth Godin.

5. Practice: Embodying Your Curvy + Beloved Body, a class taught by two of my favorite women: Anna Guest-Jelley and Vivienne McMaster.

6. This Rumi poem, shared by Christa Gallopoulos.

Water, stories, the body
all the things we do are mediums
that hide and show what is hidden.

Study them
and enjoy this being washed
with a secret we sometimes know
and then not.

7. Truthbombs from Danielle LaPorte, “You’re having an effect,” and “You’ll do it when you’re ready.” P.S. I love how I collect these to share with you and never see the connection between them until I copy and paste them into a post, see them together. It’s a weird sort of magic.

8. Wisdom from Geneen Roth,

What do you believe would happen if you allowed yourself to feel your feelings instead of avoid them or swallow them with food?

Where in your body are your feelings located? What color are they? What texture? What shape? If you don’t know, take a wild guess. Assume you’re innately sane, extraordinarily wise, and your job is to ask questions. You don’t have to manufacture answers. They have been there all the time, sleeping under the brown grocery bag of your broken heart, but you haven’t looked.

Every time you feel stuck, every time you think you know why you are doing something, but you can’t seem to make yourself do it differently, write a dialogue with yourself.

Be open to the outcome. Assume nothing. Be ready for anything. You will be constantly surprised.

And this,

To discover what you really believe, pay attention to the way you act—and to what you do when things don’t go the way you think they should.

Pay attention to what you value. Pay attention to how and on what you spend your time. Your money. And pay attention to the way you eat.

You will quickly discover if you believe the world is a hostile place and if you need to be in control of the immediate universe for things to go smoothly. You will discover if you believe there is not enough to go around and if taking more than you need is necessary for survival. You will find out if you believe that being quiet is unbearable, if being alone means being lonely. If feeling your feelings means being destroyed. If being vulnerable is for sissies or if opening to love is a big mistake.

And you will discover how you use food to express each one of these core beliefs.

9. A poem from the Dalai Lama, “Never Give Up.”

No matter what is going on
Never give up
Develop the heart
Too much energy in your country
Is spent developing the mind
Instead of the heart
Be compassionate
Not just to your friends
But to everyone
Be compassionate
Work for peace
In your heart and in the world
Work for peace
And I say again
Never give up
No matter what is going on around you
Never give up

10. Drawing Eyebrows on Babies Will Not Disappoint You on Don’t Poke the Bear.

11. The re-education of Sarah McLachlan.

12. 271 Years Before Pantone, an Artist Mixed and Described Every Color Imaginable in an 800-Page Book on Colossal.

13. Ditch the Diet Rules: Listen to Your Body for Optimal Health on Greatist.

14. The World Can Be Better – Kid President Songified

15. I’m Sorry. I Can’t Read Your Blog Right Now on A Deeper Story.

16. Wisdom from Chögyam Trungpa,

The Buddhist approach is: Just do it, on the spot, rather than reliance on the great white hope that something just might happen, and therefore, we should push toward it. The Buddhist approach is not really based on hope. It’s based on just sitting and doing it on the spot. Then a person’s mind begins to take a turn more toward experience, rather than faith alone.

17. These 27 People Are All Awesomely Clever… And Maybe A Little Jerky. LOLOL. on Viral Nova.

18. A Living Worth Scraping on Elephant Journal. I always feel like articles like this need a disclaimer, or a post script that explains that while this is true, that it would be lovely if people did work they love, someone also has to clean up —  take out the trash, pick up the poop, clean the bathroom, change the diapers — and that we all need to pitch in and help keep things together, even when that sometimes requires we do things we don’t really “like.”

19. Good stuff on BuzzFeed: Look What Two Art Students Leave On A Classroom’s Chalkboard Every Week and The 100 Most Important Cat Pictures Of All Time.

20. “All Of Me” Gets A Vintage Soul Cover You’ll Listen To On Repeat on Huffington Posts. It’s a really good cover.

21. 4 Tips On Creativity From The Creator Of Calvin & Hobbes on Fast Company.

22. Wisdom from Harry Emerson Fosdick, “Hating people is like burning down your own house to get rid of a rat.”

23. Wisdom from Karen Maezen Miller on Facebook,

Once you hear the Dharma, it ruins you for non-Dharma.

And,

The problem is not that we are hurling ourselves into the unknown. We are always hurling ourselves into the unknown. The problem is that we think otherwise.

24. Susan Piver on compassion, “Compassion is the ability to hold both love and pain in your heart, simultaneously.”

25. On Being podcast: Joan Halifax — Compassion’s Edge States and Caring Better.

26. Wisdom from Mara Glatzel, “You are a worthy contender for the life that you are yearning for, but the only one who can truly grant you the permission to live it, is you.”

27. 30 Lessons from the ♥ Your Community Blog Tour on Yogipreneur.

28. When I am Among the Trees, a poem from Mary Oliver.

When I am among the trees,
especially the willows and the honey locust,
equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,
they give off such hints of gladness.
I would almost say that they save me, and daily.,/p>

I am so distant from the hope of myself,
in which I have goodness, and discernment,
and never hurry through the world
but walk slowly, and bow often.

Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, “Stay awhile.”
The light flows from their branches.

And they call again, “It’s simple,” they say,
“and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine.”

29. What People Say When Asked To “Tell The World Anything” on Huffington Post. “The producers of a recent video series place a single camera in a public part of New York City — Washington Square Park, in this case — and hang a sign telling people to ‘Tell the World Anything.'”

30. 10 Things to Add to a Simple Life on Be More With Less.

31. Me & You, an animation from Story Corps.

32. Her Girlfriend Never Tells Her How Her Day Went. I Wouldn’t Either If This Was How My Days Ended., a beautiful and personal tribute to nurses on Upworthy.

33. Ten Steps for Creating a Personal Mandala on Elephant Journal.

34. Dallas Clayton Merchandise.

35. Anne Lamott on Mother’s Day.

36. Lessons from a Zen Garden by guest blogger Karen Maezen Miller on New World Library.

37. 28 Abandoned Structures Still As Vibrant As The Day They Were Deserted on Huffington Post.

38. Good stuff on Medium: The Gluten-Free God Is a False God and Finishing School: Why the hazing rituals of graduate school aren’t worth the trouble.

40. The whole Mother’s Day enchilada on Superhero Life.

41. Shared on Rowdy Kittens Happy Links list: Meditation: Heart Advice from 3 Exceptional Women, and How to Become a Writer, and Blogger Pulls Off $30,000 Sting to Get Her Stolen Site Back.

42. Let Go of Shoulds and Stress and Let Yourself Do Nothing on Tiny Buddha. A Week of Being sounds wonderful…

43. Feel your life while you’re in it, a beautiful quote shared on A Design So Vast.

44. An Animated Ode to What a Dog Can Teach Us About the Meaning of Life on Brain Pickings.

45. Which reminds me of this, GoD And DoG by Wendy J Francisco.

46. Sales advice from the world’s crappiest salesperson (aka: me) from Paul Jarvis.

47. 5 Little Things That Make My Life A Million Times Better on Thought Catalog.

48. Who would you be if you didn’t hold back? from Ronna Detrick.

Something Good

1. Wisdom from Maya Angelou, “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” No kidding.

2. The Daring Interview Series: Meet Gavin Aung Than on Brene’ Brown’s blog.

3. How to End the Endless Game of Catching Up on Be More With Less.

4. Wisdom from Mara Glatzel, “Believing takes practice.” (P.S. Click the link and read the whole newsletter. I promise it’s worth it.)

5. These 22 Photos Will Make You Fall In Love With Foxes on Bored Panda.

6. 17 Baby Elephants Learning How To Use Their Trunks on BuzzFeed.

7. Jawdropping views of cozy homes built in an abandoned office tower, a lagoon, a recycling heap and more on the TED Blog.

8. When I Am Among the Trees by Mary Oliver.

When I am among the trees,
especially the willows and the honey locust,
equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,
they give off such hints of gladness.
I would almost say that they save me, and daily.

I am so distant from the hope of myself,
in which I have goodness, and discernment,
and never hurry through the world
but walk slowly, and bow often.

Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, “Stay awhile.”
The light flows from their branches.

And they call again, “It’s simple,” they say,
“and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine.”

8. 4 Good Reminders When You’ve Had a Bad Day from Marc and Angel Hack Life.

9. 20 Magical Tree Tunnels You Should Definitely Take A Walk Through on Bored Panda.

10. He Sent A Photo Of The Sunset In Japan To His Parents. What He Got 20 Minutes Later Is Beautiful. on Viral Nova.

11. The biggest adventure: forever, then all of a sudden from Christina Rosalie.

12. Trust and attention, the endless dance and The right moment from Seth Godin.

13. Wisdom from Isabel Foxen Duke,

Trying to control our weight is really just an attempt to control the uncontrollable — primarily, but not limited to, what other people think of us…There is nothing you can do about uncertainty in life…except stop trying to control it. Let go or be dragged.

14. The Crossroads of Should and Must by Elle Luna on Medium.

15. Real Artists Have Day Jobs by Sara Benincasa on Medium.

16. Dealing and Healing After Loss: 9 Tips to Help You Get Through the Day on Tiny Buddha.

17. Note from the Universe,

Everything in your life, right now, Jill, is awesome. Everything is in its right place, under grace, and whether or not this makes perfect sense yet, one day it will. And the time swiftly approaches when you’ll be exceedingly grateful for all that has brought you to this day and contributed to who you’ve become, because it is exactly that person who is now poised to live as you have always dreamed you would one day live.

18. A reminder from Brave Girls Club,

You know so much more than you think you know, you just have to remember it. There’s so much wisdom in that amazing heart of yours that just needs to be reminded and listened-to and encouraged to speak out.

Think about when you were a little girl….all of those hopes, dreams and ambitions that were unique and wonderful and unabashed. What held you back as you grew older, from wanting or working for those tender dreams?

Don’t be afraid to be the person that you thought you might grow up to be….that person that you dreamed of being…that amazing woman that you looked into the future to see when you were a little girl. Uncover those dreams again and believe in them….shoot for what is deepest in your heart…and be the woman that you always wanted to be.

19. How I Became a Buddhist and What It Really Means from Sandra Pawula.

20. Shared by Susannah Conway on her Something for the Weekend list: Dani Shapiro on mastering the craft of writing.