The blue of meditative mind.

I love the color blue whenever I find it in Nature, in large part because it ushers me directly into a meditative state of mind, where my awareness is as wide as the sky. One of the early desert fathers - Evagrius Ponticus - spoke of "the blue sapphire of the mind." I agree!

Photo: Mountain Gentian with Nokhu Crags in the background, Never Summer Mountains, CO, August 29, 2015

Reading, vigils and prayer lend stability to the wandering mind.

"Reading, vigils and prayer - these are the things that lend stability to the wandering mind."

Evagrius Ponticus,
4th century Desert Father 

Photo: Joanne reading "The Expected One" in the beautiful desolation of the Hewlett Burn, Poudre Canyon, CO, January 17, 2015

Reading, vigils and prayer stabilize the wandering mind.

 

"Reading, vigils and prayer stabilize the wandering mind."

Evagrius Ponticus,
Christian Desert Father,
4th century Egypt

Photo: Joanne reading at our campsite in the Devil's Garden Campground; Arches National Park, UT; May 4, 2014

Reading the book of Nature.

"A certain member of what was then considered the circle of the wise once approached the just Antony and asked him: 'How do you ever manage to carry on, Father, deprived as you are of the consolation of books?' His reply: 'My book, sir philosopher, is the nature of created things, and it is always at hand when I wish to read the word of God.' "

Evagrius Ponticus,
4th century Egypt

Photo: "The Book," Lumpy Ridge, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO; November 23, 2013. The Book is quite popular with rock climbers. Antony was a monk who lived in the Egyptian desert.

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At the time of meditation, our own state of mind appears like the color of sapphire or sky.

"When the mind, having stripped off the old self, has been re-clothed with the self that comes from grace, then it will see its own state at the moment of meditation like the color of sapphire or of the sky, what Scripture calls the dwelling of God which was seen by the Ancients on Mount Sinai."

Evagrius Ponticus,
A Desert Father, 4th century Egypt

Photo: Subalpine Firs and bluish layers of mountain ridges; Mount Baker Wilderness, WA; July 23, 2013

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