“Coming to
the life of the imagination, then, is both a liberating path of understanding
and a fearful exercise in self-revelation. We must face not only the
simple guiding images alive in our breasts, but the long years we have
neglected them."
David Whyte
Who is David Whyte?
is a poet, author and internationally recognized
speaker. Many Rivers is the vehicle for David Whyte's poetry, for
the discovery and enjoyment of all poetry, and for the qualities that
poetry stands for: courageous speech, individuality, the particularity
of things and the deeper patterns of the human psyche. In addition
to giving public talks and workshops, David is one of the few poets
to bring poetry into the world of organizational development, where
he works with companies around the world.
"Anyone not prepared to look a little foolish now
and again would be better not starting this path."
"Any artist or manager worth their salt must be prepared
to do bad art or be prepared to fail at a planned goal now and again.
It is the same spirit that is caled on when we brainstorm ideas, where
no image or conception is off limits." David Whyte
"The basic elemental building blocks of human aspiration
are the elemets of individual imagination, those partcular images to
which a person's inner longings and desires naturally turn to express
themselves." David Whyte
Crossing the Unknown
David Whyte and John O’Donohoue crossed my path when I was invited
to solo show and didn’t know what to paint. I just loved it how
poet and abstract painter walk the same path one with word and other
one with color. While I was reading David book
_The Heart Aroused_
I found title of my show “Crossing
the Unknown” and the rest was history. How beautiful, falling in
love with this two Irish poet as they cross my path during my own unknown
path. I am sure if I knew everything then I would miss them. Below is
some of my aha moment when I was reading his book - I love his poem
and writing he is a gift to all of us
“There are certain harvests that never come to us
again If they are not gathered in season. More fearfully, we must face
the part of us that may not have planted in the first place.” David
Whyte
“those with busy lives, but bereft of the inner images based on
the soul’s desires, have empty larders and no fire in the hearth;
they will starve if they are not fed something more nourishing. Especially
if the abundant season of fall changes to winter.” David Whyte
“Rilke ask us to fall toward our own personal destiny, no matter
what that destiny my able, to feel the natural weight of the soul’s
images and desires,”
“His life (Rilke) is neither the notes nor the silence between
the notes, but the music that arises out of sound and silence felt as
a living whole. Stop choosing, he says, between chaos and order, and
live at the boundary between them, where rest and action move together.”
“ you can never eliminate the process of chaos from existence,
but equally, you cannot completely cover over the calmness that lies
at the center of everything. Embrace reality by embracing both. Stop
choosing! All very well, we say, “but show me”.
“The basic elemental building blocks of human aspiration are the
elements of individual imagination, those particular images to which
a person’s inner longings and desires naturally turn to express
themselves. Previously, we have left this life of the imagination to
poets and artists.”
