Be Astonished by Beauty
Trauma has a profound impact on our feelings of aliveness, often generating a state of numbness or anaesthesia. This anaesthetised state protects us for a time from having to encounter the raw, searing emotions that often accompany trauma, but it also dulls our sensual engagement with all that surrounds us. Beauty’s allure helps to fully open the aperture of the heart. Sorrow and beauty side-by-side. The soul has a fundamental need for encounters with beauty—a central source of nourishment that continually renews our sense of vitality and awe.
Francis Weller – Foreword – Choose Earth, by Duane Elgin
Be Astonished by Beauty
Trauma has a profound impact on our feelings of aliveness, often generating a state of numbness or anaesthesia. This anaesthetised state protects us for a time from having to encounter the raw, searing emotions that often accompany trauma, but it also dulls our sensual engagement with all that surrounds us. Beauty’s allure helps to fully open the aperture of the heart. Sorrow and beauty side-by-side. The soul has a fundamental need for encounters with beauty—a central source of nourishment that continually renews our sense of vitality and awe.
Francis Weller – Foreword – Choose Earth, by Duane Elgin
Neil often experiences wonder and awe as he sensually engages through observation and open-hearted vulnerability. His poems reveal humbling reflections of love, grief and gratitude for the living and dying systems we inhabit. Especially now, in these difficult and challenging times, may your journey be easier as you find resonance in his words, know that you are not alone, and learn to honour your own feelings and experiences of the ever-present beauty, goodness, truth, love, humour and grief around us.
Neil loves honouring the colours, relationships and life-forces of nature, the way light plays on water or leaves, the cycles of the seasons, and patterns that surprise and delight. Experience the world through his eyes and heart. Immerse your soul in his world of colour and beauty, share his love for life; and, as you do, be encouraged to seek out and honour the awe-inspiring beauty near you. No doubt, you too will find that beauty’s allure helps fully open the aperture of Your heart.