Remembrance

Letter 4564

Remembrance — purple linocut illustration

For what will I be remembered? The chores I do each morning? The flock? My tidy rooms? My devotion to you, Lord?

❖

When past, it will be my effect on others that will be recalled. My neighbors will remember how they felt with me.

Let me create fond memories today.

Consider:

Can I be kind to all today?

Reading:

❖ “What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult to each other?” — George Eliot, Middlemarch

❖ “Try to be a rainbow in someone’s cloud.” — Maya Angelou, Letter to My Daughter

❖ “A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches, and loving favour rather than silver and gold.” — Proverbs 22:1 (KJV)

Thank you for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.

Flowing

Letter 4563

Flowing — purple linocut illustration

A lake, to be living, I need an inflow and an outflow.

The guidance and strength to act.

The inclination and fact of my acting for the benefit of others.

❖

Inflow and outflow.

Let me not be stagnant, Lord.

Consider:

Can I both receive and give today?

Reading:

❖ “You give but little when you give of your possessions. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.” — Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

❖ “All flourishing is mutual.” — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass

❖ “Freely ye have received, freely give.” — Matthew 10:8 (KJV)

Thank you for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.

Thanks

Letter 4562

Thanks — purple linocut illustration

Do I speak words of thanks?

Do think thoughts of thanks?

Do I act in the way of thanks?

The grass grows, the sun rises and shines, the air is clear, the ground supports my feet.

❖

Each a boon. Together, a miracle.

Let me take nothing for granted today.

Consider:

Can I live a day of gratitude?

Reading:

❖ “The world is so full of a number of things, / I’m sure we should all be as happy as kings.” — Robert Louis Stevenson, A Child’s Garden of Verses

❖ “Praised be my Lord for our brother the wind, and for air and cloud, calms and all weather,” — Francis of Assisi, Canticle of the Sun

❖ “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits:” — Psalm 103:2 (KJV)

Thank you for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.

Experience

Letter 4561

Experience — purple linocut illustration

I have come this way before, and again before again. This path, these trees, this stream. Over and over have I walked this way.

My neighbor wonders how to get to a distant village. This is the way. I explain it, but they must make the journey.

❖

My experience, can it help them? I know the taste of the air here, and the feel of the stones. Will that get them closer to their destination?

I only have what I know. Let it be enough, even as it seems it is not.

Consider:

Can I allow my experience to help others today?

Reading:

❖ “I am a part of all that I have met;” — Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Ulysses

❖ “I felt a tender Compassion for the Youth, who remained entangled in Snares, like those which had entangled me” — John Woolman, Journal

❖ “Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble,” — 2 Corinthians 1:4 (KJV)

Thank you for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.