Blessing for Beginnings
If you are well,
If you are fit, and ready, and healthy,
And energized,
Then now is the time to begin.
Begin the novel, begin the exercise regime,
Begin the new you, begin the home improvement,
Begin the resistance,
Begin to shape the granite of institutions with the stamp of your character,
Begin the kindness experiment,
Start to change the world in accordance with the dreaming
That is larger than yourself. The you within you has been waiting
For this moment, the emergent maybes and what-ifs have bubbled
On the brink of mattering.
Now, not some future date, not some time of the mind,
Move into this moment.
Begin it simply, with a flourish of the hand,
A turn of the eyeball
A gesture towards the ultimate agreement of all things.
If you are well, then now is the time to begin.
If you are unwell:
If your bones are brittle and your body’s cavities filled
With the ache of generations; if your spirit cries out “no more”,
If you seek healing.
Know that the beginning has already happened.
The beginning of your healing has begun,
The plant that will make your ointment is springing out of the ground,
The doctor that will help cure you is being trained,
The solution to the problem that has vexed you for years
Is being formed in the skyward chaos kitchen even now.
You may not feel like healing has already begun,
It may feel a long way off, I know,
But the universe is at work
On your own balm.
Even the final resolute healing into absolute peace,
That is feared but also in its way, a blessing, is already at work
In our lives.
The God of all changes will not leave you the way you are today.
Things may become even worse, for a time, it’s true,
But they will return to peace. And joy will find its way in too.
And you will not always be unwell. For the meantime,
As healing has already begun, might as well act as if it’s already here,
And pretend we are well. And if we are well,
Then now is the time to begin.
Bob, this blessing is perfect. Now is all there ever is. What we do with it is act and find the richness we encounter. Acting may be analyzing, but putting off just drags us down. And in that place, it is hard to act.
Be well, and thanks,
Jim