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Sharing Outdoor Space For The Inner Journey

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This year we celebrate the 25th anniversary of THE QUIET GARDEN MOVEMENT’s foundation. Arising from the INSPIRATIONAL IMAGINATION of our dearly loved Revd. Philip Roderick, there are now 300 Quiet Gardens around the world. 

In our garden, a group has met every month for these 25 years.

6 of us reflected on what these meets mean to us:- 

Practise putting words to tentative reformulation of own spirituality: Being space: Coming aware of the awe and wonder of creation: I bring people and it’s not for them: The group is very open at a deep level.. this relates to it being an established group: Need to feel comfortable to be open: A place where you can take time in silence to be challenged: Every now and then I see myself as member of the human species, not just a single being: The universe being conscious of itself…Go away refreshed. www.quietgarden.org


Playing with Language

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For the past 50 years, we’ve hosted PLAY READING groups. First in Malaysia, introduced to companionable, self expanding evenings by Oliver Baudert: an inspirational actor, living now in Australia. In the present clime of funding threats to libraries, the counter-force of delight in language and ACTING thrives in such small committed groups, in local AmDram, and go-watch National Theatre productions at our local cinemas. Our heroes are listed in “500 Power People”.. Mark Rylance, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Judy Dench, Kenneth Branagh….. Countless community groups act out the CHALLENGES of the times, using car parks, any old hall, on the South Bank..on the streets.

Crafting life drama with WIT, WISDOM , WONDERFUL WONDERFUL WORDS.

 

Cat’s Eye Nebula from the Hubble telescope

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It lies 3 thousand light years from Earth across inter-stellar space. It is the brief glorious phase in the life of a Sun-like  star. The truly cosmic ‘eye’ is over half a Light Year across.

Of course astronomers may well be seeing the destiny of our Sun when they view this image.

Our sun is destined to enter its own planetary nebula phase of evolution in about 5 billion years.

A light year is the distance that light travels in one year and is 186,000 miles per second x 3,600 x 24 x 365 miles in a year.
http://www.star.ucl.ac.uk/~apod/apod/astropix.html

 

Touched

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Went to hairdressers today. Ken aged 70, works independently at a salon in a local Elderly Care Home. There were four women awaiting Ken’s skilled attention. Three of us had a little sing- song. ” Jesus wants you for a sunbeam ” Sunday school and Salvation Army ditties from our childhood. We all emerged ..coifed grey curls. Ken in considerable arthritic pain, working steadily through the queue. I was TOUCHED by Ken’s devotion to re-create head-strong  dignity, for us women.

 

Remembering TINA our dancing friend

By Blogs

In a crowded space, just a few of us started to Belly Dance. Tina danced. Tina lent us gloriously jangly wraps. ( I bought a purple one, laden with tin coins) , Tina played music . Laughing so happily, we shoved unsupple bodies into undulations !!!!              ‘And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane, by those who could not hear the music’ –  Nietzsche

 

The Peace of Wild Things

By Blogs

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

– Wendell Berry (http://dallasegrets.org/?page_id=122)

Pond Life

By Blogs

I belong to ‘Wildlife in Ascot’, so I KNOW that we must have a wildlife pond ! Totally ignorant as I am about such wonderments, what I’ve gathered is that you WAIT for inhabitants to arrive. At the start there were only copulating flies, upheld by surface tension. But I like the idea of waiting for the guests….Ah! The smallest of frogs, sighted ! New Year’s  Day .. statuesque, large Heron.

 

A Panto

By Blogs

Rainy, January afternoon. Victorian community hall, ten minutes from home. Seven Grown- Ups  on the back row. ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’.

Report :- ” They were very  good at shouting, singalonging, laughing, clapping with vigour”.

I was on the end seat with leg-room. Had to squint down the row to my left, to check that I’d got the hand moves OK, in the songs.

Excelled equally with the surrounding myriad small children… in ” Be brave Jack ” … “Oh no it isn’t / is” and outstandingly in ” It’s behind you” … enter very very small Ghost.

At night I lay in bed,  HAPPY.

 

Speak Up and Speak Out

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Speak Truth to Power, another banner held aloft :- Democratic elections, Referendums, Petitions, Mediations, Strikes, Demos, Sit-ins, Riots, Revolutions, War, Despair, Suicide, Physical breakdown, Mental Breakdown…..

Solidarity, Resilience, Community, Self-reliance, Listening, Sharing, Strategies, Evolution, Engagement, Cooperation, Systemic analysis, Legal challenges, Commitment, Determination, Courage, Compassion …..

HOPE !

VIVA !!   [ Pix of ASCENT local environment network getting stall ready to encourage ‘Speak Up & Speak Out’ at annual Carnival]

The Hero’s Journey

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If you have the guts to follow the risk…if one follows what I call one’s “bliss” – the thing that really gets you deep in the gut and that you feel is your life – doors will open up…if you follow your bliss, you’ll have your bliss, whether you have money or not – Joseph Campbell. For more quotes :- http://www.azquotes.com/author/2387-Joseph_Campbell