Gratitude and Thanksgiving

© Genesis + Art Studio

FROM OUR STUDIO:

Effortlessly,
Love flows from God
Into man and woman.
Like a bird who rivers the air
Without moving her wings.
Thus we move in this world
One in body and soul,
Though outwardly separate in form.
As the Source strikes the note,
Humanity sings –
The Holy Spirit is our harpist,
And all strings
Which are touched in Love
Must sound.


– MECHTHILD of MAGDEBURG
  13th CENTURY MYSTIC

Waves of inspiration

Photo © Heidi Hoffman Photography

FROM OUR TRAVELS:

Walking the beach along the Oregon coast. Continuing the Sabbath and allowing it all to incubate deep within. It was good to spend time with daughter Heidi. She is an inspiration on so many levels.

A time for Sabbath

AlexEli Vineyard. Image © Heidi Hoffman Photography

FROM OUR JOURNAL PAGES:

I’m still on the vineyard. After two weeks of being back in Kansas City, my mind and heart are still on the vineyard. Our intension was to help Phil, Heidi and Phil’s mom Anita with the fall harvest at AlexEli. But something else happened in the midst of working. The life of the vineyard showed us a fruitful rhythm of growth and harvest, of life ending and beginning. It also became a Sabbath time. A time of מְנוּחָה menuchah, of tranquility, peace, serenity and the deepest possible sense of fertile, healing stillness. The physical labor of harvesting, pressing and storing the juice that will change to wine mysteriously engaged our spirituality. Through our senses we seemed to become involved in the experience of creation, with the process of grapes turning to wine and it surprised us with unexpected grace. We participated in a potent moment where creation renewed itself, witnessing both the inevitable recession of what is complete and the sacred forces of healing that promises love and life.

Sabbath is meant to change the rhythm of our lives and strengthen our human connections with the Divine. Sabbath creates a sacred time, leads us towards a mindfulness and a destination of experiencing simplicity. I think it is also about time—about slowing down the pace at which we choose to live, and about how quality is as important as quantity. We can’t always live in Sabbath time, which is why it occurs just one day in seven, but our retreat into a different time and space changes the rest of our time and space for the other six days and in our case, two weeks and counting. I have found a similar shifting of time and space occurs during the process of art making. In the mystery of creating, I have a sense of connection to the divine, in the physical making of art and a feeling of rest and spiritual renewal as a gift of the creative harvest.

I have experienced something powerful about intentionally setting apart a time to withdraw from quotidian life and do something that slows my rhythm, restores my creativity and refreshes me in a new beginning . What I most look forward to in a Sabbath experience is stillness. It can be the stillness the psalmist refers to, “be still and know…” and offers a restoring of our soul. I also feel that Sabbath is an incubator for creativity and wisdom.

Time and chemistry will be the guiding forces as the harvest turns to wine. Waiting is not easy for me, but in the process I know that it prepares a place for grace to be born. “Taste and see that the Lord is good.”

In the vineyard feast of All Saints

Watercolor sketch at AlexEli © Genesis+Art Studio

FROM OUR SKETCHBOOKS:

We returned today from an inspiring trip to AlexEli Vineyard & Winery in Oregon. On our flight home we were reflecting on the ancient wisdom stories around the process of growing, harvesting and turning grapes into wine.

Living in the city has taken us away from the familiar feeling of having hands in the dirt, to be more closely connected to the labor of tending the garden. The earth, the elements that nature brings and the constant nurturing and tending to the vines all lead to this moment of the harvest. We have new appreciation for Phil and daughter Heidi for the hard work and passion that goes into the ongoing process of growing and tending a vineyard.

We offered ourselves as able bodies and hands to help in the process of the fall harvest. Hours mostly swept by in what seemed minutes, not unlike the creative process, transforming the fruit into the juice that will become wine.

We took a break from the work and headed with our sketchbooks down to the lake. This new rhythm of the earth offered an opportunity for the quiet solitude of nature. The more closely I studied the landscape, the sounds and the smells around me, the more beautiful it all became. I realized that haven’t been good at taking the time to observe the things that give life. It was a thin place for reflection and inspiration and we felt the spirit working through the land, wildlife, friends and family in this quiet place.

The thin place of heaven meeting earth inspired and made us look more closely at the saints in our lives.