ForeverMissed
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His Life

A Community of Spirit

January 14, 2018

Rumi, Jelaluddin. The Big Red Book: The Great Masterpiece Celebrating Mystical Love & Friendship. Trans. Coleman Barks. New York: HarperCollins, 2011.//

 

A Community of the Spirit

 

There is a community of the spirit.

Join it, and feel the delight

of walking in the noisy street

and being the noise.

 

Drink all your passion and be a disgrace.

Close both eyes to see with the other eye.

Open your hands if you want to be held.

 

Consider what you have been doing.

Why do you stay

with such a mean-spirited and dangerous partner?

 

For the security of having food. Admit it.

Here is a better arrangement.

Give up this life, and get a hundred new lives.

 

Sit down in this circle.

 

Quit acting like a wolf,

and feel the shepherd's love filling you.

 

At night, your beloved wanders.

Do not take painkillers.

 

Tonight, no consolations.

And do not eat.

 

Close your mouth against food.

Taste the lover's mouth in yours.

 

You moan, But she left me. He left me.

Twenty more will come.

 

Be empty of worrying.

Think of who created thought.

 

Why do you stay in prison

when the door is so wide open?

 

Move outside the tangle of fear-thinking.

Live in Silence.

 

Flow down and down

in always widening rings of Being.

 

From John's readings

January 21, 2012

from Calendar of Wisdom by Leo Tolstoy, this page bookmarked and underlined:

There are two different states of human existence:  first, to live without thinking of death; second, to live with the thought that you approach death with every hour of your life.

The more you transform your life from the material to the spiritual domain, the less you become afraid of death.  A person who lives a truly spiritual life has no fear of death.

When you have doubts about what to do, just imagine that you might die at the end of that same day, and then all your doubts will disappear, and you will see clearly what your conscience tells you, and what is your true personal wish.

A man condemned to immediate execution will not think about the growth of his estate, or about achieving glory, or about the victory of one group over another, or about the discovery of a new planet.  But one minute before his death a man may wish to console an abused person, or help an old person to stand up, or to put a bandage on someone's injury, or to repair a toy for a child.

---

This, John actually did in his last days in hospital;  SEVERAL people, workers in the hospital, came to visit him and he counseled them. 

At the end...

January 5, 2012

This is the book that John took with him to the hospital.

One day a nurse came in and asked:  "what are you reading?" John said Your True Home, by Thich Nhat Hanh-- do you know what your true home is?" 

She said, "No, what?" to which JTE replied:  "NOW."

Your True Home is in the here and the now.  It is not limited by time, space, nationality, or race.  Your true home is not an abstract idea, it is something you can touch and live in every moment.  With mindfulness and concentration you can find your true home in the full relaxation of your mind and body in the present moment. ---Thich Nhat Hanh

To Praise is the Whole Thing

November 17, 2011

(From Sid Jordan)

To praise is the whole thing!

A man who can praise comes toward us like ore out of the silences of rock.

His heart, that dies, presses out for others a wine that is fresh forever.

When God's energy takes hold of him, his voice never collapses in the dust.

Everything turns to vineyards, everything turns to grapes, made ready for harvest by his powerful South. 

The mold in the catacomb of the King does not suggest that his praising is lies,

Nor the fact that the Gods cast shadows.

He is one of the servants that does not go away, who still holds through the doors of the tomb trays of shining fruit.

 

Rainer Maria Rilke   Sonnet VIII  from Sonnets to Orpheus

November 17, 2011

 

John Thomas Edwards, Ph.D., 70, of Durham, N.C., died on Thursday, November 10, 2011, at Durham Regional Hospital due to complications from leukemia. He is survived by his sister, Lane Whitaker, of Raleigh, N.C., his nephew Mike Jordan, of Atlanta, his nieces, Kay Jordan, and Jill Jordan, both of Raleigh, N.C., many beloved grand-nieces and grand-nephews, and dear friends and colleagues.

John was born on January 14, 1941 in Fort Valley, Georgia to his parents, Raynell and John Thomas Edwards, Sr. He spent his youth there, working in the family department store and peach orchard business.  From an early age he had a deep appreciation for the natural world which he maintained all of his life.

He graduated from Emory University in 1963 with a degree in psychology, and upon graduation, enlisted in the United States Navy and served in Vietnam, as a personnel officer in Saigon with the task of writing letters to the families of those who died.  After his service he returned to Atlanta where he worked for the Georgia State Government as Job Analyst.  He entered graduate school in 1973 at the University of Georgia and earned the M. S. in Psychology and the Ph.D in Counseling Psychology in 1977.  From 1978 to 1981, he worked in Charleston, South Carolina as staff psychologist at the Charleston County Substance Abuse Commission, and at the Franklin Fetter Family Health Center where he was Director of the Department of Counseling and Therapy.

In 1981 John came to North Carolina where he found and pursued his life's work.  John was an approved supervisor in the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT) and conducted and supervised family therapy for the past 30 years.  He worked diligently with school systems and served as director of counseling in a family health center, clinical director of an inpatient family care program, private practitioner in marriage and family therapy, and co-founder of a learning center for family therapy.  He served as adjunctive faculty at Duke University Medical Center. John conducted hundreds of training events in the U.S. and Canada. He authored numerous books on working with families; his latest was published by John Wiley & Sons October, 2011.

John was a cherished teacher, colleague, mentor, friend and companion. Everyone who knew him was influenced in a deep and lasting way and he will be greatly missed.

Across the state of North Carolina arrangements are being made for the creation of scholarships and foundations in John's honor.