Monday Musings: The Bloom of the Present Moment

First poppy bloom of the 2009 garden side bed

While the weather here in SE Wisconsin has been toward the cooler side, summer is definitely in the air.

I feel languid and drowsy and dreamy.

And I love it.

Love it so much, in fact, I sort of just want to lay in a field of wildflowers and get lost for, oh, a month or two.

So I continue to play with how I can flow with this energy and get some work done.

On Friday, flow meant waking up and deciding to forgo my usual yoga and meditation time.

(The house was quiet and my daughter, amazingly, was still asleep.)

Instead I listened to the birds talk. I watched the tom turkeys strut. I monitored an industrious chipmunk scurry back and forth to its nest with a mouth-full of seeds. I noticed the shapes of clouds. I opened up windows to let the breeze in. And I took my camera out to capture the first poppy bloom.

I was completely blissed out, and I was reminded of this Thoreau quote:

There were times when I could not afford to sacrifice the bloom of the present moment to any work, whether of the head or hand.

Sometimes, on a summer morning, I sat in my sunny doorway from sunrise till noon, rapt in a revery, amidst the pines and hickories and sumacs, in undisturbed solitude and stillness, while the birds sang around or flitted noiseless through the house, until by the sun falling in at my west window, or the noise of some traveller's wagon on the distant highway, I was reminded of the lapse of time.

I grew in those seasons like corn in the night, and they were far better than any work of the hands would have been.

— Henry David Thoreau from Walden

I'm glad I honored the bloom of the moment on Friday. I felt nourished, alive, and filled with wonder. From it, I — and my soul — grew fuller.

Tell me, where is the bloom of the present moment in your life today?

P.S. I'm honored that one of my favorite artists for inspiration and authenticity, Christine Mason Miller, featured my blog and one of my photos in her Five Things post last week. (She also listed several other yummy links.)

If you don't know Christine's blog or her wonderful art or her inspiring, soul-soothing book, you should.

Several of Christine's art icons are on the right-hand column of this blog. My favorite for today is BE HERE NOW.

Comments

[Bronwyn]

I LOVE this quote. Exactly. These are the days when I dream of spending a whole day in meditation on a single bloom opening. One day I will do just that.
Thanks for this, and thanks for stopping by the Artful Life!

[Shannon]

Bronwyn,
Thank *you* for stopping by…I look forward to getting to know you and sharing what seems to be a mutual love for art, an inspired life and flowers!!
Love and light,
Shannon