Just for Today....

Just for today, I feel a keen awareness of the gift of life and its unknown quantity, so I think I must remember to live with every breath and act.  
Just for today, I am grateful for abundance: love, food, joy, hope, health. 
Just for today, I am grateful for the freedoms I enjoy: to worship, believe, to love, to do, to dream, to feel. 
Just for today, I am grateful for abilities: to walk, hug, smile, speak, read and write, to run, and swim and glory in the gifts of the Divine.  
Just for today, I am grateful for every single person in my life: those I cherish, those who challenge me, those who show me, those who love me, those who walk with me, in this life, and beyond. And that means YOU too.... 

Ecclesiastes 3 ( I've exercised poetic license and included the parts I wanted to share, just for today.)

 1 To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
 2 A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
 3 A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
 4 A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
 5 A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
 6 A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
 7 A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
 8 A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
 11 He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end.
 20 All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again.

 I love you,

Jill

Sunset at Pigeon Point ©2013 jill e vaile

We Are Always One

And in the beauty of your words I hear the beat of my own heart. My feet move along the road behind you, yet I am free to deviate from the certain lead I follow. In those roads of grace I find my solace and truth. And it is then that you are behind me. In this life we change places often, and you soothe my feet in the softness of white warm sand and scented strewn velvet petals, as they heal from the brokenness of the detour.
Today my hand extends to your heart, and I reverently imbue the purity of your light, and feel it as it seeps into me, just as peace and strength join our spirits.
I am open to your warmth and touch, and I am grateful for the sweetness of your smile. The emotions of humanity are reflected in one tear as it wends its way down your cheek. Your love adds the myriad of rainbow colors and together we project a beam that is both beauty and bright, and welcoming to others. Come and take my hand, so we may be one with the souls who seek to join us.

These are the words of my heart this morning, as the darkness fades to light and the day begins.
I am grateful.
I love you.

Sunset at the Golden Gate

5.12.2013 Happy Mother's Day!

I'm up at the crack of dawn this morning. I am grateful I am able to stand and drink in the beautiful place where I live, from the inside out. I breathe in G-d and breathe out fear, and pain, self-doubt and non-acceptance. And I feel myself as a part of.
I'm connected to the earth and the sky. I hold the gifts of wonder and wisdom.

I am a woman, a daughter, a child, a mother, a lover, and a friend.
And I am powerless over all of these things: they are the gifts with which I entered this life.

I'm grateful for qualities such as nurturing, and patience. The former I believe I always had, the latter I have worked hard to improve. In different times and places in life these have kept me alive, and allowed me to hold others in my arms, and help them breathe too. The canvas that holds the colors of this landscape include me as well. And I am grateful for the connectedness that is my life today, one day at a time.

Today I wish you all a Happy Mother's Day, those of you who are mothers, and all of your mothers too, whether they still grace this life, or have moved on. To those of you who have children, or pets, or the just the capacity to love, because our DNA enables us to reach out. We are all custodians of this world. As women, we are all mothers of one sort or another.

Today I am grateful to know the fragility and preciousness of life, to embrace the holding of a tiny hand, or a frail one, and all that fall in between.
It is the embrace that has the most meaning, as I share my heart with yours: all the hopes and dreams of a lifetime are found in that simple reaching out to one another.

Happy Mother's Day, today and every day.