Beauty is before me,
And beauty is behind me.
Above and below me hovers the beautiful.
I am surrounded by it.
I am immersed in it.
In my youth I am aware of it,
And in old age I shall walk quietly
The beautiful trail.

I think it was the Buddha who said something like how rare it was to experience life, and rarer still to be born a human. It is so easy to get caught up in the busyness of each day, to not notice how much we exist in a dream-like state, to have one day follow another and when we look back see them all as one long homogenous stream.

When we are truly awake and look not with the eyes but with the soul we can see the beautiful everywhere – in the rocks and trees, in a windswept paper or rusted can, in the color blue and the sound of thunder. I read somewhere that when we see the beauty of nature we are giving it energy and love that is felt and appreciated by the trees and grasses and plants.

That is probably true for do we not all feel loved when someone tells us we are beautiful, do we not bloom in the sun of that appreciation?

2013 is nearly over now, just a few short days left to wind up this cycle. What have we done and left undone this year? What gifts have we been given and received? For what will this year be remembered? What hopes do we carry forward, what desires wait to be fulfilled? How many moments will we be truly awake and walking the beautiful trail?

Peace and blessings.