"If our style of looking becomes beautiful, then beauty will become visible and shine forth for us . . . When we approach with reverence great things decide to approach us. Our real life comes to the surface and its light awakens the concealed beauty in things. When we walk on the earth with reverence, beauty will decide to trust us . . . There are times when beauty reveals itself slowly. There are times when beauty is shy and hesitates until it can trust the worthiness of the beholder . . . Beauty waits until the patience and depth of a gaze are refined enough to engage and discover it. In this sense, beauty is not a quality externally present in something. It emerges at that threshold where reverence of mind engages the subtle presence of the other person, place or object. The hidden heart of beauty offers itself only when it is approached in a rhythm worthy of its trust and showings. Only if there is beauty in us [in our loving gaze] can we recognize beauty elsewhere: beauty knows beauty . . . There is a profound balancing within beauty."
John O'Donohue
Yesterday I went looking for the Purple Lady's Slipper Orchid and found several dozen plants in a small section of the spruce-fir zone of our mountains. Because the flowers are nodding and because the four petals tend to curl over and shroud the "moccasin" part of the flower, I had to get down on the ground, tilt the flower upward, and bend the petals a bit to get a full view. The entire flower is only about a half-inch across, and most people wouldn't even notice it as they pass by on the trail. For me, the secretive quality of this Lady's Slipper hints at the attitude of mindfulness that is necessary to become aware of many of the beautiful things in life.
Photo: Purple Lady's Slipper Orchid is very rare and is considered endangered. I found these on the Fern Lake Trail in Rocky Mountain National Park (CO) on July 1, 2013
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