July 2010

Beauty is the theme for July.   A reading in our hymnal Singing the Living Tradition comes from the Navajo Indians of North America—“Beauty is before me, and beauty behind me, above me and below me hovers the beautiful.  I am surrounded by it, I am immersed in it.”

Assume this to be true.  Wherever you are, look around, listen, what beauty do you notice?  What beauty is subtle?  What beauty takes your breath away?

When you look beyond the surface, what beauty is revealed?

When you take in beauty, when you let yourself feel surrounded by it, immersed in it, part of it, what shifts happen in you?

Maybe this month of July you’ll have a chance to clear clutter from your life and create clear spaces of beauty.

After clearing, treat yourself to a movie.  Movies on the theme of beauty include:  Cherry Blossoms showing beauty in impermanence, death, and new beginnings. American Beauty which finds odd hiding places of beauty, Girl With a Pearl Earring with light illuminating the beauty of objects and faces, Enchanted April where places of beauty work wonders for body, mind and soul, Departures with the treatment of beauty in music, relationships, and death, and The King of Masks with longing and beauty in expectations and relationships. Try keeping a journal of the beauty you see each day.  What was the most surprisingly beautiful thing you noticed?   What act of beauty did you witness or do?

May you know your own beauty.  May you know yourself to be surrounded by beauty, immersed in beauty, capable of beauty.