Rocks

I am learning about rocks. The gifts of a beauty.filled friendship has encouraged this love affair of feeling the Earth through its mineral echoes.

And I digress.

You see...

...just as life is made up of day and night, and song is made up of music and silence, friendships, because they are of this world, are also made up of times of being in touch, and the spaces-in-between.

Being hooman, we sometimes fill these spaces with worry, or we imagine the silence is some form of punishment, or we internalize the time we aren't in touch with a love one, as some unexpressed change of heart. Our minds work very hard to make something out of nothing. We can perceive silence as rejection in an instant, and then build a cold castle on that tiny imagined brick.

The only release from the tensions we weave around nothing, is to remain a creature of heart. By giving voice to the river of feelings as they flow through and through, we can stay clear and open.

In daily terms, we call this "checking in with other," though most of us reduce this to a shopping list: "How are you today? Do you need any milk? Eggs? Juice? Toilet paper?"

Though we can help each other survive with such outer kindnesses, we help each other thrive when the "checking in" with each other comes from a list of inner kindnesses: "How are you today? Do you need any affirmation? Clarity? Support? Understanding?"

When we ask these deeper questions directly, we wipe the mind clean of its misperceptions. Just as we must dust our belongings from time to time, we must wipe away what covers us when we are apart.

Wishing you all a wonder.filled, wholehearted friendship filled evening.