365 Days, Day 282

In our consciousness there are many negative seeds and also many positive seeds. The practice is to avoid watering the negative seeds, and to identify and water the positive seeds everyday (Thich Nhat Hanh)

Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless – like water. Now you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup, you put water into a bottle, it becomes the bottle, you put water in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend (Bruce Lee)

The symbolism of water has an undertone of purity and fertility. In Taoist tradition, water represents wisdom. Water will always take the path of least resistance until it can flow smoothly. In our spiritual journey we should aspire to this.

I love being in (warm) water, I love the soothing effects of the water as it envelops me. I always think, when I read Alexander McCall Smith’s books about Bertie’s mother who regularly goes for her flotation-tank-sessions, how wonderful it must be to float in water for a long period of time.

I found some symbolic meanings of water:

• Transformation
• Subconscious
• Fertilisation
• Purification
• Reflection
• Intuition
• Renewal
• Motion
• Life

The sound of running water is calming and peaceful. We used to have a fountain outside our bedroom at 15 Estelle Street; I rather miss that. In fact we don’t have a water feature or pool of water anywhere at 4 Bennett Close. In our own house a plan will have to be made. Or we could right next to the sea?

I am going to have a warm bath now and become the water… albeit rather purple water as I plan to wash my hair in the bath.

365 Days, Day 101

Nothing in the world is more flexible and yielding than water. Yet when it attacks the firm and the strong, none can withstand it, because they have no way to change it. So the flexible overcome the adamant, the yielding overcome the forceful. Everyone knows this, but no one can do it (Lao Tzu)

The cure for anything is salt water - sweat, tears, or the sea (Isak Dinesen)

For whatever we lose (like a you or a me),

It's always our self we find in the sea.

(e.e. cummings)

All of our family are water signs: Tom is Scorpio, I am Pisces, Kyle and Roarke and Ariel are Cancerian. The three water signs are supposedly compatible. I like to think this is why our home has a peaceful energy enveloping it.

My favourite part of the day is my bath-time. Since the twins were babies bath-time has always been my off-duty relax time. In our Roodekrans home we have a beautiful blue bath. As it is part of the en-suite bedroom, sadly I am no longer using it whilst visiting here. But last Thursday when I was traumatised, Sarah ran me a special bath, with candles and music. What a wonderful gesture: thank you Sarah.

Water can be soothing and gentle and restorative. It can also be very destructive. We need to have great respect for life-giving water. We need to be resilient and yielding when it comes to water. If we stand firm and stiff in a current, we will be snapped in twain. But if we bow and move with the current we are more likely to survive.

I am working on my resilience.