I don’t know about you, but this year seems to be off to an especially busy and stressful start. Today, with this poem shared at a training event, I was reminded of the need to balance our (never ending!) day-to-day demands with adequate space or breathing room. I hope this serves as a gentle reminder for you, too.
Feel free to share your thoughts: Where do you need to add space between your logs? In what ways would adjusting the blend of wood and air provide you with a healthier balance of light, warmth and sustenance?
Fire
What makes a fire burn
is space between the logs,
a breathing space.
Too much of a good thing,
too many logs packed in too tight
can douse the flames
almost as surely as a pail of water.
So building fires requires attention
to the spaces in between,
as much as to the wood.
When we are able to build open spaces
in the same way we have learned
to pile on the logs,
then we can come to see how
it is fuel and the absence of the fuel, together,
that make fire possible.
We only need to lay a log
lightly from time to time.
A fire grows
simply because the space is there,
with openings in which the flame
that knows just how it wants to burn can find its way.
~ Judy Brown ~