• clouds,  quotes,  trees

    Enjoy the Surprises

    A touch of soft pastel pink clouds outside the coffee shop

    We humans can easily lose our perspective on our humble place in the universe. We get locked up in our heads, prisoners of our limited ideas and thoughts, cutting ourselves off from the wider world of experience. We forget or are simply unaware that we are part of an immense cosmic history that continues to stretch into a vast unknown future.

    Ilia Delio

    I cringe when I hear anyone claim they know how a situation will turn out, how people will react, or the course nature will take. Even when challenged about their assumptions, they will say yes they know. Way too much ego for me and a total turnoff. I admit we can make pretty accurate assumptions based on past evidence and experiences but we cannot predict the future. Just ask any weather forecaster. So, I try to live life with the awareness that I don’t know all that my ego would like me to think I think I know, or believe all my assumptions and opinions. And, in truth those assumptions and opinions are evolving over time. When I remain in a place of humility, accepting my limited ideas and thoughts as just that, I am open to the wider experiences life offers. Then, I’m in a place to watch as the day unfolds and enjoy the surprises, like soft pastel pink clouds outside the coffee shop! Happy Valentine’s Day!

  • fall season,  leaves,  Plants,  seasons

    Telling on Myself

    I’m telling on myself. Thursday morning I took a few images at Pineridge Natural Area of the predawn light. I did not shoot many images, making 7 compositions, placing the horizon in the various locations in the frame. When I loaded them on the computer at home they were all underexposed. I then discovered I had set the camera in manual mode yesterday and never checked the exposure. I made a critical assumption the camera would take care of everything, all I had to do was make the composition. Wrong. Way too much dependance on the camera and not checking my settings!

    A lot of seasonal changes are taking place here in Colorado. As the nights get longer and there’s less sunlight, leaves stop making chlorophyll, losing their green colors, some change to yellow, orange, red, brown and gray. These leaves will freeze in winter, so the trees are letting go, allowing them to decompose and restock the soil with nutrients for next spring. I love this time of the year and this process of dying to renew life.

    I attended my 55th class reunion dinner last night and enjoyed catching up with them. One facet of reunions is finding out more have died than I knew about. Just the same we get to reminisce about our youth. I’m leaving a few minutes to attend today’s picnic. I am finding it interesting how little I really knew about my classmates and the erroneous assumptions I had about them in high school. And that is also true of how they perceived me. Many thought they didn’t fit in. Just like me! Fascinating to me.

  • Arches National Park,  landscape,  musings,  National Parks,  writing/reading

    “From my experience….”

    Arches National Park
    Arches National Park

    All of us have heard people say, “I know…” when they really don’t. And, if we’re honest, we are well  aware of the times we say it, and don’t. There is a saying that “what I think I think I know, ain’t so.” Reality is we do not know what another thinks or feels unless they share that with us and that is filtered through their ability to articulate and how we listen and understand. We do them an injustice when we assume to know. Our assumptions can easily be our imagination or a thought which we quickly make into a false reality. We’ll believe it. I’ve not found this to be a good foundation for a conversation or relationship. So, what if we were to say, “From my experience….” or something similar. Seems the mind wants to know, plan, or control the next moment, as if it’s real, rather than stay in the present and find out what we don’t really know.