Crossing a Bridge

 ~ Setting Out ~Life is a great adventure; the first steps taken in memory, the present passage being made this very moment, and the future, a map of possibilities. Whether you’re taking a short trip or a long sojourn, it’s all part of one journey, one long and winding path. To see with your own eyes, feel your way with your own hands. To make decisions and strike out in a singular direction. To reevaluate, to change course if necessary. To catch the updraft and dodge the undertow. To know the world through the prism of your heart, and to know your heart through its reflection in the expanse of all things. A wide open place to shout the secret of your wildest dreams, and hear your voice come echoing back, gathering layer and perspective. “Oh, the places you’ll go,” the great Dr. Seuss reminds us. Here’s to a little inspiration to encourage the first step, a companion in the final mile, and a reminder that the journey really is the destination.

 ~ Crossing a Bridge ~

"Make voyages! Attempt them ... there’s nothing else."
—Tennessee Williams

On your way! Go! Vamoose! What are you waiting for? No, really. What are you waiting for? The bridge is there, waiting to be crossed. Greener pastures may grow on the other side, or browner, but you won’t know until you get there and see for yourself. You can stay and prepare, or you can set out today.

Pack your ambition, your curiosity, and your openness, and embark on the adventure of a lifetime.

"May angels gather at your shoulder."
—Mary Anne Radmacher

"Blessings for any trip. Guides come forward when needed, help arrives just in time, and unseen hands send you on your way.
I travel not to go anywhere, but to go.
I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move."
—Robert Louis Stevenson

"Make it new."
—Ezra Pound

"Make it fly, let it soar.
Make it work, keep it real.
Make it shine, make it last.
Make it fun, pass it on.
Travel light: Lay out what you think you need. Take half.
Leave plenty of empty space for new experience.
Thirty spokes share the wheel’s hub;
It is the center hole that makes it useful.
Shape clay into a vessel;
It is the space within that makes it useful.
Cut doors and windows for a room;
It is the holes which make it useful.
Therefore benefit comes from what is there;
Usefulness from what is not there."
—Tao Te Ching by Lao Tsu
(translated by Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English)

"We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations."
—Charles R. Swindoll

"At first glance it may appear too hard. Look again. Always look again."
—Mary Anne Radmacher

"I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that don’t work."
—Thomas Alva Edison

"Every strike brings me closer to the next home run."
—Babe Ruth

If there is a rule for success, this is it:
Reach higher, get stronger. Fail and learn and try again.

"The power of imagination makes us infinite."
—John Muir

"The magic is inside you. There ain’t no crystal ball."
—Dolly Parton

"The original definition of courage is to tell the story of who you are with your whole heart."
—Brené Brown

"Men go abroad to wonder at the height of mountains, at the huge waves of the sea, at the long courses of the rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motion of the stars, and they pass by themselves without wondering."
—Saint Augustine

Now crossing the bridge into inner space, bring a guidebook of the soul.
This map is not to scale. Wonder expands into every open space.

 "Live water heals memories. Look up the creek and here it comes, the future ..."
—Annie Dillard

Take me to the water. Lapping in the rhythm that marked the beginning of all moments. Memory and motion. Layers of love and loss and longing.
Take it to the water.
(Red Wheel Weiser)