a moment

a moment

Each moment a precious space.
Never like the one before,
or any that will come.
With a breath it arrives,
and moves on.
We hardly notice its beauty.
The miracle of it awaits our attention.

 

How many moments are there? Is a moment a second, or something even smaller, or bigger? Is a moment a breath, both the in and out breath, or each a separate moment? Is a moment a feeling? an experience? a memory?

However defined, how many ‘moments’ do you notice in a day? How many spaces -however larger or small – do you create in your day to simply notice, to awaken?

There are a million little miracles awaiting you this day.

 

* I took this photo of honeysuckle in my backyard on a sunny morning.

choice awakens

Choice awakens

Choice

awakens

in every

moment

as an invitation

we can accept

over

and over

again.

This poem was most certainly inspired by how I spent the month of February, taking the Real Happiness Challenge with Sharon Salzburg. Now I’m reading through her book, Real Happiness, to reinforce my discoveries. One of the most helpful insights is how we are at choice in each moment and how, because we are human, we get to keep choosing over and over again.

Other related posts:

• back to now
• the power and magic

 

* I took this photo in San Agustinillo, Mexico with the zoom on my little Canon powershot.

This Precious Moment

This Precious Moment

I look into your eyes;
a deep well invites me in.

I listen to your words;
their syllables envelop me.

I touch your presence;
a palpable energy showers me in light.

Illuminated, you leave me curious.

What awakens your spirit?
What makes your heart sing?
What do you love more than anything?

Here. Now. Together.
We live in this breathing, precious moment.

One of the gifts of my job is that I meet amazing people. Truly amazing people.

One of them is Katiuscia Barretta. We met through the Mindfulness@IBM community that I started in 2015. She was instrumental in growing our community and creating awareness of the value of mindfulness in the workplace. She wrote a series of blogs about the neuroscience of mindfulness and made connections with the qualities of working in agile ways and applying design thinking. We led four different 6-8 week mindfulness series during 2015 and 2016, and we are at it again right now.

Part of Kat’s approach is to close each week’s session with a short inspirational reading, usually a poem. She introduced me to some wonderful poetry (such as There’s a Hole in my Sidewalk). And, she invited me to share my own poetry. One week we came up short and I was inspired to write something.

This poem was inspired by practicing mindfulness with Kat and my colleagues at work.

 

* I took this photo from Dilek National Park in Guzelcamli, Turkey (which has a view toward Samos, Greece).