Spring Equinox

The Gift of Attentiveness

Waxing moons. Shifting sands. Turning tides. During such times of change the waters are turpid, opaque, thick. Look carefully…slowly.

Keep watch! Stay alert! Be vigilant! This is our job in the days of equinox. More than ever we need to pay attention for the waters are high and the current is strong.

It’s a time for “in-sight.” To see into things.

In our murky culture it’s difficult to see clearly. Everything is fast, shallow, punctuated.

Yet, writers of the interior path remind us that there is another way of seeing:

Plagued by a highly diffused attention, we give ourselves to everything lightly. That is our poverty. In saying yes to everything, we attend to nothing. One only can love what one stops to observe. “Nothing is more essential to prayer,” said Evagrius, “than attentiveness.” (Belden Lane, The Solace of Fierce Landscapes)

The time of equinox signals that a new season is beginning.

It’s an invitation to stop resisting the current’s might.

Follow its lead.

See where it takes you.

Discover its beauty by being attentive to all that is revealed.