Dare boldly

A blog by Louise Gallagher

Tag Archives: 52 acts of grace


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Seek to find value in all things | 52 Acts of Grace | Week 29

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It can be easy sometimes to think in absolutes when skies are dark and it feel like the darkness will never end.

Yet, even behind grey clouds, the sun is shining. And even after the darkest night, the dawn is waiting on the horizon.

Fin the value in the grey cloud day — for me, I look at a cloud day as an invitation to spend time in my studio — without guilting myself into feeling like I should be doing something outside in the yard.

I love candlelight, so dark mornings are an opportunity to meditate with a candle burning.

Find value in all things, and let the value you find be your invitation to create peace, love, joy and harmony in your life.


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Create Better | 52 Acts of Grace | Week 27

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I wrote this post after spending the day yesterday updating my website.

I didn’t consciously give a lot of thought to how what I was doing was going to ‘create better’ for the world around me, and those in it, yet, intuitively, at the foundation of everything I did to update my website was the desire to create opportunities for all of us to live with grace and find our inherent magnificence. And thus, to create better for all.

It is fundamental to the work I want to do in the world.

To create better. To touch hearts and open minds and set spirits free to dance fearlessly in a world of love, joy and harmony.

For me, ‘to dance’ doesn’t meant how I move my feet or stay in time to the music. It means letting my spirit soar, setting my heart free, giving my soul free rein.

It means fearlessly listening to the voice deep within me calling me to untether myself from social constraints and be. Me.

Be Me so you can Be You and together we can BE all the world needs to let go of fear and trauma, anger and abuse, violence and war.

It is not an easy task but I believe we are capable of doing it.

We are discovering cures for intractable diseases. We are discovering ways to explore Mars, the deep, deep sea. We are tunnelling to the centre of the earth, building skyscrapers that defy gravity, surely we can create better for all mankind too.

For this week, ask yourself, “What am I doing to create better in this world?” And do it.

Namaste.


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Take a walk in nature | 52 Acts of Grace | Week 25

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It is fall. My favourite time of year. Morning rises with crisp cool air. The sun’s rays lengthen and feels as though they are seeping deeper into my skin, as if summer’s kisses have softened the surface to let autumn’s rays melt into my bones in preparation for winter. I hold the memory of their warmth within me.

Beaumont bounces more easily along the trails, the heat of summer no longer holding him back from examining and sniffing every blade of grass and fallen leaf.

It is easy to forget to ‘stop and smell the roses’. To walk as if the purpose of exercising Beaumont is my only reason to be outside.

I purposelessly slow down. There is time. And there is a beautiful fall canopy of rustling golden leaves to enjoy.

Richard Rohr writes,

The energy in the universe is not in the planets, nor in the atomic particles, but very surprisingly in the relationship between them. It’s not in the cells of organisms but in the way the cells feed and give feedback to one another through semi-permeable membranes. The energy is not in any precise definition or in the partly arbitrary names of the three persons of the Trinity as much as in the relationship between the Three! This is where all the power for infinite renewal is at work:

The loving relationship between them.

The infinite love between them.

The dance itself.   (Source:  The Center for Action and Contemplation)

We are all part of a relational universe. We are all connected.

Get outside and connect to nature. Be intentional in your relation to the flow of nature all around. Be part of love flowing always. In and out. In and out.


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Give a little forgiveness| 52 Acts of Grace | Week 11

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Let’s face it. It is impossible to get through life without some hurts and pains. Big, medium or small, life offers up thousands of opportunities for we humans to be perfectly human in all our human imperfections.

Often, the other person may not have intended to hurt us. They may have been acting out from their place of pain. They may not even realize there is pain in their response.  Just as when we have been the one to cause pain or hurt, we did not intend it or did not know the source of our own unease that caused us to say or behave the way we did.

It isn’t what happened that makes the difference in your life today. It’s what you do with it.

Give a little forgiveness.

No one deserves to be abused, lied to, manipulated. No one deserves the countless things that happen in their lives that push them down. Name calling, deceit, the loss of a loved one, loss of any kind, feeling humiliated, feeling alone, feeling like you don’t belong.

No one deserves to have their feelings ignored, their truth called a lie, their beauty called ugly.

Yet, it happens.

The challenge is, when what happened ‘then’ continues to dictate how we feel, behave and see ourselves in the now, it isn’t the past that’s hurting us any longer. It’s our repetition of ‘the story’ we’ve created about what happened that is causing our distress.

Give a little forgiveness.

Sure, it may feel awkward, uncomfortable, different. Do it anyway.

And, if your mind immediately leaps to “I will never forgive ____________.” ask yourself, what does holding onto resentment, bitterness, distress get me? How does it serve me today?

This is not a big sweeping, I forgive you, will forget it ever happened or a ‘it’s okay, I swore I’d never let you back in my life and I still don’t trust you but I will’, kind of forgiveness. You may never want to let them back into your life. And that’s okay. That’s your decision. Only you know what is the best for your life.

Forgiveness isn’t about making what another did right or okay, or acceptable. It’s about releasing yourself from the past, letting go of the story you are telling yourself that keeps haunting you, hurting you, holding you down.

Forgiveness is not for them. It’s for you.

And once you’ve started practicing a little forgiveness, keep practicing. It’s not about biting it off all in one big chomp. It’s about taking tiny little bites that are manageable. Bites that slowly nourish you with their soothing grace, setting you free to flow into life without the wounds of the past limiting your brilliance today.

Give a little forgiveness.

And don’t forget to give yourself the same grace.


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Words of Affirmation| 52 Acts of Grace | Week 2

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Last weeks act of grace was to share a smile, a stranger, a co-worker, a store-keeper. Share a smile and really feel its value.

As I travelled on the C-train, walked along the street I learned an interesting lesson — it’s hard to share smiles when people’s faces are turned down so they can read things on the tiny screen of their cell phones.

It is an ubiquitous posture. People sit, stand, walk, head down, chin tucked in, hands in front holding a tiny cell phone.

It’s hard to catch their eyes.

Except for the three people sitting on the bench on the sidewalk at the end of the block near my office. Their eyes were easy to catch. Two of them sat on the bench, one of them lay on the ground straight out across the sidewalk in front of the bench.

His eyes were closed. I wasn’t sure if he was hurt, sleeping, passed out…

As I walked up I stopped to ask the two people on the bench. “Is he okay? Does he need help?”

They smiled at me. Waved their hands in the air as if to say, “Nah. Everything’s okay.”

The man on the ground opened his eyes at the sound of my voice. Sat up.

“Do you need any help?” I asked him.

“I need five bucks!” he said, his voice filled with enthusiasm.

I laughed out loud and replied, “So do I!”

And we laughed together.

He got up to sit on the bench.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” I told him before continuing on my way, the sound of his laughter ringing behind me.

A few other people did smile back during the week. The C-train driver whom I waved at and smiled as the train pulled into the station.

The woman running towards the doors as I held them open for her.

The man I smiled at when he stood to let a mother and child have his seat.

The woman on an elevator who like me, was wearing shoes, no socks, even though it was a frosty morning. We had a lovely chat about our desire to believe it’s spring.

The woman at the street corner waiting for the same pedestrian light to change.

But it was stunning to see how many people were so engrossed in the small screen they held in their hands.

Note to self: Do less looking at my cell phone. Do more smiling at people.