Lightly Child, Lightly

~ Live & Learn

There’s a lightness in things.

Only we people move forever burdened,

pressing ourselves onto everything, obsessed by weight.

How strange and devouring our ways must seem

to those for whom life is enough.

— Rainer Maria Rilke, “Part Two XIV,” from Sonnets to Orpheus

Notes:

  • Photo: Elif Sanem Karakoç
  • Post Title & Inspiration: Aldous Huxley: “It’s dark because you are trying too hard. Lightly child, lightly. Learn to do everything lightly. Yes, feel lightly even though you’re feeling deeply. Just lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them.”

25 thoughts on “Lightly Child, Lightly”

  1. Thank you for this share. Rilke was a particularly venerated poet of my father – I have inherited some tiny little hard-bound books by Rilke and this citation is just one glorious example of his finely tuned craft. It gives me great joy to find this today, now, at this moment, a time very stressful for me. I am in dire need of any calming/uplifting words I can grab.

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  6. Reblogged this on It Is What It Is and commented:
    How true!! … ‘There’s a lightness in things. Only we people move forever burdened, pressing ourselves onto everything, obsessed by weight. How strange and devouring our ways must seem to those for whom life is enough.’

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  7. I love Rilke. I struggle with this verse.

    I find myself wanting to quibble, to say — There is a lightness in all of us. It is the things we collect, pile onto our lives that weigh us down and forgetful of our ‘lightness of being’.

    But then, it could be I am feeling the weight of the Chinook arch that hangs grey and heavy in the sky above me this morning…

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    1. BTW — I was just writing a note of gratitude to you on my blog — your post inspired me this morning — and I was adding the link to Rilke’s sonnet but it goes to a different book — Being Caribou

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  8. As I have come late to this poetry thing, Rilke is one of those names I have heard about but never read. I love how you truly illuminate me daily, David. Thank you.
    And I have to agree with, I forget who and am too lazy to go check… you really do have a thing for redheads, don’t you 😉

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  9. Pingback: Morning Reveries | Dare Boldly

  10. But I think we all come to a point where what life we have IS enough. Maybe it’s just finally understanding that what we have is what we have. Friendship wise, money wise, family wise. And even those precious things we eventually lose. Holding fast onto what i have!

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  11. Beautiful and all so true. The more I practice, the more I feel moments of this delightful truth, but we accumulate our heaviness over many years, and over many years we must learn to let it go. 🌈🦋

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