John O'Donohue

I have not, obviously, kept up with this blog at all this year. I've found Advent to be very rough going, much more difficult in an inexplicable kind of way than I had anticipated. I don't feel brave or hopeful or anticipatory at all.

But I read this, here, this morning. Words like courage and plenitude seem as foreign to me as Hebrew and Greek have been over the past two years of study, but I am not completely immune to the prospect of new beginnings and rhythms.



For a New Beginning


In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life's desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.


~ John O'Donohue ~