Sunday, June 06, 2010

In The Stillness

May has ended and we are entering June. I'm noticing stillness all around me. This is not the stillness of Winter when much becomes dormant, quiet and in hibernation. This is the stillness of Summer when there is a more lazy and centered movement. It's the stillness of contentment.

The woods around my home are greening. The frenetic activity of the critters has slowed. Birds are sitting on their nest now. There is plenty of food on the floor of the woods and in the trees. Breaks are easily taken during the middle of the day when the shadows of the trees around the creek provide a peaceful resting place to absorb the cooler, darker, moister air. There is a new stillness.

The nights are still noisy. The peepers come out around dusk. But their talk is more like neighbors chatting on the front porch than the calls of those looking for a mate. The owl still makes a vocal appearance each night before the morning sun rises. It's a low, slow hoot now. The whippoorwills get vocal every dusk and dawn, but they seem to be talking of the celebration of Summer instead of the need for attraction. And the phoebes have ceased their incessant calling and tapping on my windows.

Even the thunderstorms roll through with low, lazy, long rumbles, taking their time to pass over and soak my world.

The creek has become slow and vague, veiled by the undergrowth and hosting dragon and damselflies on the sand bars that are starting to appear as the water slows after the Spring rush. It simply trickles now over rocks and downed trees, smelling of sun-soaked cedar and warming summer grasses. It has become another creature entirely, as it meanders through the tall grasses and ferns.

Even the mosquitoes seem less interested in biting, giving me fair warning before they pick a spot on my exposed skin.

Sit back, breathe deeply, rest. It's June and such an opportunity to enjoy stillness. Stillness is not necessarily where activity ends. It can be where creation begins. When you become still, you let go of not movement but, instead, control. Stillness can be very dynamic. But its movement contains no conflict and is, instead, in harmony with the actions you take. It is your truth come home to rest, simply letting go of the thoughts that bubble to your surface, allowing them but not controlling such thoughts.

"Within you there is stillness and a sanctuary to which you can retreat at any time and be yourself." ~Hermann Hesse