Eid al Adha, the Muslim feast of sacrifice, honors Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his beloved son to fulfill God’s command. Sacrifice is a complicated subject, and one that many of us have an ambivalent relationship to.
When have you willingly make a sacrifice for the greater good? When have you resisted the call to sacrifice when you felt it would cause unwarranted harm?
Infant primates—whether human or gorilla—are born with a reflex that makes them grasp on to whatever comes to their hands. Holding on is part of who we are from the very beginning. Letting go takes a whole lot of practice.
How are you learning to hold on or let go?
Baby birds go through a stage when their feathers are just fluffy down—utterly adorable, but no use for flying. But any new endeavor goes through that fluffy stage in which we are simply not prepared to launch yet.
What in your life feels like it is still fluffy and not quite ready to take flight?
“Nature is infinitely creative. It is always producing the possibility of new beginnings.”
—Marianne Williamson
Where do you see the promise of new beginnings in the natural world around you?
When things are tightly in bud you can’t really tell what you will get as they unfold. This bud could produce a colorful, ruffled flower or something that more closely resembles a pinecone.
When have things unfolded for you in a way that you found completely surprising?
