The book exercise seemed simple enough – sit on a large piece of paper/cardboard and draw a circle around yourself. The intent was to notice how it felt to draw a circle around yourself and then to step outside and notice any difference. Hmmmmm. I had no paper large enough. Then I remembered a roll of Christmas paper. Could I fit? Yes! I drew the circle and inside the circle I outlined my sitting with folded legs. It kinda (emphasis upon kinda) looked like a heart in the center of the circle.

Standing I noticed how small the paper seemed on the kitchen floor. I took the paper outside and held tight in the gusting wind. Laying the paper on the yard it seemed even smaller than when it laid upon the kitchen floor. I looked around me to the back of the yard, neighboring houses, the sky and even the mountain in the background. So small. So small. Standing in the center I stretched my arms out. I became larger than the circle drawn when sitting. I walked around in ever widening circles. I closed my eyes and saw me walking a circle around the block beyond the yard, the circled loops around the mountain trails and around the lake. The circle, indeed, was but one moment. I was truly much bigger than the square of paper fluttering in the wind. The circle may have been true but it was not Truth. 

And then the whisper of how when I sit in meditation and prayer, I am small like the circle. Sitting I draw in the stillness, quiet, and pain of the world. Standing, my heart and arms are opened wide. I rise from sitting end engage in movement expanding the sitting circle. Like the expanding circle of ripples from a stone cast into the lake, one no longer sees the small hole or circle where the rock entered and sat. Only the ripples getting larger and larger in their circles as they move outward are visible.  But to see the circled ripples one must cast the stone, one must sit. 

I do not know if this was the intent of the exercise. Laughing to myself, I do not know if this little scrich even makes sense. Perhaps the whisper for all who should read is to know your circle cannot be defined or drawn. Rise. Open your arms. Move. Let the ripples from casting your heart vibrate throughout Indra’s net and touch the earth.