Hi, Susan, Loved your most recent post about Celtic spirituality and Creation. Serendipitously, I began my morning by listening to a wonderful interview between Krista Tippett and the late poet/philosopher/teacher John O'Donohue. The topic? "The Inner Landscape of Beauty" Your post and the interview/podcast mesh beautifully and have given my brain so much to contemplate--as well as much more reading material to explore! Blessings to you, Susan.
Hi, Jacque! Synchronicity at work.... I love it. I'll have to look for that interview with Krista Tippett and John O'Donohue. I've read several of his books, and wish I could have worked with him. Enjoy the exploring and reading. Blessings back to you!
I wonder if your DNA has carried your yearning for Celtic spirituality- your red hair/British isles heritage- and I love to think of life as ongoing re-creation, continual revelation
It could be my genes, or it could simply be my "memes," a word coined to mean the units of cultural transmission that we pass on from generation to generation by how we live, like language or taste in food or ceremonial practices--or spiritual beliefs. Or it could be both! Re that red hair: my Norwegian granddad (who had chestnut-red hair until he died at 107) always said it was the Vikings gift to the Celts. :)
And isn't it heart-opening and spiritually nourishing to think of life continually creating itself, continually inventing and revealing new sacredness? I find that so nourishing.
What a beautiful photo of the sunrise, dear Susan. Thanks for sharing it and your Celtic epiphany with us. The bit of Celt that resides in my genes comes through my mother's family, and since today would have been my mother's 101st birthday, I am wishing she were here to read this piece as well. I know it would have resonated with her as much as it did with me.
What a lovely compliment. It makes me smile to think your mom would have appreciated this newsletter. Happy 101st birthday to her spirit! And if today's her birthday, that means you were almost her birthday present. :) Thank you for reading and commenting!
A couple of things related to your insight around creation being life forever making/changing/growing itself:
Dave Abram once mentioned that he sees the Big Bang as not something that happened long ago at the beginning, but more vitally as what IS happening in every moment....very much what you’re getting at.
And as you may know, having lived in proximity to the Santa Fe Institute, the still-birthing science of complexity and emergence speaks to this as well. One of the leading theorists (Stuart Kauffman) summarized it in a book entitled “Reinventing the Sacred.” However, that and much other writing in the field is quite, well, complex (!) and a bit inaccessible unless you’re used to reading primary science writing. Recently, I came across a new book that is by far the most readable for a layperson--yet also free of the fuzzy, slightly too easy new age oversimplifications. It’s relatively short (under 200p), too. Neil Theise, “Notes on Complexity: A Scientific Theory of Connection, Consciousness, and Being. Highly recommended for nature mystics and animists of all stripes!
Thanks for commenting, Jim. I've heard Stuart Kauffman talk, and have Reinventing the Sacred on my list to read, but I admit that he's a bit well, dense and abstract for me. As a botanist, I'm a fieldworker, not a theorist! So I greatly appreciate the mention of Neil Theise's book. I'll add it to my (lengthy) to-read list. It sounds very much worth the read.
This reminds me when Alan Watts said, “We do not "come into" this world; we come out of it, as leaves from a tree. As the ocean "waves," the universe "peoples." Every individual is an expression of the whole realm of nature, a unique action of the total universe.”
Oh, lovely, Mary! Thanks for the Alan Watts quote--it's such an expansive way of expressing the idea of life flowering "as leaves from a tree." I think of all beings as people (plant people, animal people, insect people, and so on), so to say it as the universe 'peoples' is so apt!
I'm a huge fan of J. Phillip Newell. I started reading him when I moved to the coast of Maine over two years ago. I've always lived in more urban environments. Now I see the tides change from my window and I have to cross two bridges and two islands on my short commute to work. It's not just the beauty that changes me, but also the sense of being a part of creation, being surrounded by it, rather than going to see it. I think being close to the ocean shifts perspective too. My horizon is not tall buildings but the immensity of the ocean. So God becomes less about ideas and more about the energy of creation.
Todd, it sounds like your move to Maine began an epiphany that is unfolding still, like the sacred force of ever-flowering life on earth. Your comment that it's the sense of being part of creation that is critical to that kind of shift, I think. When we feel we belong, our perspective shifts, just as having that immense horizon has shifted your understanding. May your coastal life continue to unfold with wonder and wisdom!
Love this! “‘Creation’ is simply the sacred force of life creating itself. Continually, experimenting, being born, evolving, growing in relationship with all of the other lives, dying, recycling into new forms.” Yes! As for our purpose, I’m with Thomas Berry who says we’re here to notice and celebrate through our stories, our art, our music and dance. To celebrate this great mystery with our wonderful, awe, and love. Peace.
Thank you, Julie! I agree with you and Berry that we're here as witnesses, to notice and celebrate in our creativity and also in how we behave in our ordinary lives. As I wrote in one of my books (The San Luis Valley: Sandhill Cranes and Sand Dunes): "In comparison with other species, humans are not particularly impressive. We have no fins to propel us from stream to ocean and back again, no wings to power us thousands of feet into the air, no jaws strong enough to crack deer vertebrae in one bite, no idea of how to metamorphose from caterpillar to butterfly, much less to wait out inhospitable decades as a seed. We have big brains, but they can be as much curse as blessing, leading us to imagine ourselves superior to the rest of life. What we do best comes not from our heads but our hearts, from an ineffable impulse that resists logic and definitions and calculation: love."
Hi, Susan, Loved your most recent post about Celtic spirituality and Creation. Serendipitously, I began my morning by listening to a wonderful interview between Krista Tippett and the late poet/philosopher/teacher John O'Donohue. The topic? "The Inner Landscape of Beauty" Your post and the interview/podcast mesh beautifully and have given my brain so much to contemplate--as well as much more reading material to explore! Blessings to you, Susan.
Hi, Jacque! Synchronicity at work.... I love it. I'll have to look for that interview with Krista Tippett and John O'Donohue. I've read several of his books, and wish I could have worked with him. Enjoy the exploring and reading. Blessings back to you!
I wonder if your DNA has carried your yearning for Celtic spirituality- your red hair/British isles heritage- and I love to think of life as ongoing re-creation, continual revelation
It could be my genes, or it could simply be my "memes," a word coined to mean the units of cultural transmission that we pass on from generation to generation by how we live, like language or taste in food or ceremonial practices--or spiritual beliefs. Or it could be both! Re that red hair: my Norwegian granddad (who had chestnut-red hair until he died at 107) always said it was the Vikings gift to the Celts. :)
And isn't it heart-opening and spiritually nourishing to think of life continually creating itself, continually inventing and revealing new sacredness? I find that so nourishing.
What a beautiful photo of the sunrise, dear Susan. Thanks for sharing it and your Celtic epiphany with us. The bit of Celt that resides in my genes comes through my mother's family, and since today would have been my mother's 101st birthday, I am wishing she were here to read this piece as well. I know it would have resonated with her as much as it did with me.
What a lovely compliment. It makes me smile to think your mom would have appreciated this newsletter. Happy 101st birthday to her spirit! And if today's her birthday, that means you were almost her birthday present. :) Thank you for reading and commenting!
Yes, my father always joked that I was her 22nd birthday present -- sent from him on the ship he was on in the South Pacific...
That's just sweet! They were a real love story, weren't they? Thanks for sharing that. <3
A couple of things related to your insight around creation being life forever making/changing/growing itself:
Dave Abram once mentioned that he sees the Big Bang as not something that happened long ago at the beginning, but more vitally as what IS happening in every moment....very much what you’re getting at.
And as you may know, having lived in proximity to the Santa Fe Institute, the still-birthing science of complexity and emergence speaks to this as well. One of the leading theorists (Stuart Kauffman) summarized it in a book entitled “Reinventing the Sacred.” However, that and much other writing in the field is quite, well, complex (!) and a bit inaccessible unless you’re used to reading primary science writing. Recently, I came across a new book that is by far the most readable for a layperson--yet also free of the fuzzy, slightly too easy new age oversimplifications. It’s relatively short (under 200p), too. Neil Theise, “Notes on Complexity: A Scientific Theory of Connection, Consciousness, and Being. Highly recommended for nature mystics and animists of all stripes!
Thanks for commenting, Jim. I've heard Stuart Kauffman talk, and have Reinventing the Sacred on my list to read, but I admit that he's a bit well, dense and abstract for me. As a botanist, I'm a fieldworker, not a theorist! So I greatly appreciate the mention of Neil Theise's book. I'll add it to my (lengthy) to-read list. It sounds very much worth the read.
This reminds me when Alan Watts said, “We do not "come into" this world; we come out of it, as leaves from a tree. As the ocean "waves," the universe "peoples." Every individual is an expression of the whole realm of nature, a unique action of the total universe.”
Oh, lovely, Mary! Thanks for the Alan Watts quote--it's such an expansive way of expressing the idea of life flowering "as leaves from a tree." I think of all beings as people (plant people, animal people, insect people, and so on), so to say it as the universe 'peoples' is so apt!
I'm a huge fan of J. Phillip Newell. I started reading him when I moved to the coast of Maine over two years ago. I've always lived in more urban environments. Now I see the tides change from my window and I have to cross two bridges and two islands on my short commute to work. It's not just the beauty that changes me, but also the sense of being a part of creation, being surrounded by it, rather than going to see it. I think being close to the ocean shifts perspective too. My horizon is not tall buildings but the immensity of the ocean. So God becomes less about ideas and more about the energy of creation.
Todd, it sounds like your move to Maine began an epiphany that is unfolding still, like the sacred force of ever-flowering life on earth. Your comment that it's the sense of being part of creation that is critical to that kind of shift, I think. When we feel we belong, our perspective shifts, just as having that immense horizon has shifted your understanding. May your coastal life continue to unfold with wonder and wisdom!
Love this! “‘Creation’ is simply the sacred force of life creating itself. Continually, experimenting, being born, evolving, growing in relationship with all of the other lives, dying, recycling into new forms.” Yes! As for our purpose, I’m with Thomas Berry who says we’re here to notice and celebrate through our stories, our art, our music and dance. To celebrate this great mystery with our wonderful, awe, and love. Peace.
Thank you, Julie! I agree with you and Berry that we're here as witnesses, to notice and celebrate in our creativity and also in how we behave in our ordinary lives. As I wrote in one of my books (The San Luis Valley: Sandhill Cranes and Sand Dunes): "In comparison with other species, humans are not particularly impressive. We have no fins to propel us from stream to ocean and back again, no wings to power us thousands of feet into the air, no jaws strong enough to crack deer vertebrae in one bite, no idea of how to metamorphose from caterpillar to butterfly, much less to wait out inhospitable decades as a seed. We have big brains, but they can be as much curse as blessing, leading us to imagine ourselves superior to the rest of life. What we do best comes not from our heads but our hearts, from an ineffable impulse that resists logic and definitions and calculation: love."