Showing posts with label light. Show all posts
Showing posts with label light. Show all posts

Friday, December 31, 2021

Oslo at Christmastime

I wanted to post some photos of Oslo at Christmastime before the Christmas season ends. Winter has been exceptionally lovely this year in Oslo due to the snow, which when it first falls, is magical. The combination of darkness, snow and lights is beautiful to behold. Enjoy!





Hotel Bristol's gingerbread hotel


Hotel Bristol's Christmas tree at entrance




Hønsa-Lovisas house decorated for Christmas





My wonderful new nutcracker that is now added to my collection










A place to buy fireworks--getting ready for New Year's Eve








Thursday, December 30, 2021

Light Inspired Liberated

I played one of those word games on Facebook where 'the first three words you see are your mantra for this month'. Light, inspired, liberated were the three words that I saw first. I do not usually play games on Facebook and I do not normally attribute any special meaning to any results from such games. But given that we are finishing up another dark pandemic year, I would like to apply these words to January 2022, and to 2022 in general, especially since the first word I saw was 'light'. I'd like to think that means something, even if only to me. The word 'mantra' itself is derived from a Sanskrit word meaning a “sacred message or text, charm, spell, counsel.” Even better. 

Light. Lys in Norwegian. I hope I can be a light in the lives of others in the coming year. Perhaps a light in their darkness. And I hope they can be lights in mine. We all experience periods of darkness, where life seems joyless, meaningless, hopeless. Sometimes we can be enveloped by that darkness because of sickness and/or death. There are many people I know who are sick; one of them, who has been declining gradually for several years now, found a light inside herself this Advent, and for the first time since she was diagnosed with her illness, took an active part in setting up Christmas decorations in her home with the help of her aide. When I spoke to her on the phone, she sounded happy. I have not experienced a darkness of the soul this year, despite the pandemic all around us, despite the sickness all around us. I am trying to focus on having hope because it seems as though it is in short supply. I am trying to 'light one candle rather than curse the darkness'. Literally. I understand the value of candlelight and soft lighting in the home during the darkest time of the year. I am comforted by the lights I see in others' windows. I try to find the joy and light of my childhood in this season. I seek out the memory bubble that allows me to live there, peacefully, remembering my parents and our childhood Christmases. It means bittersweet memories, but I treasure them. I cannot sing the Christmas hymns and songs that my mother liked without tears, but I treasure those songs and the lyrics. So much of Christmas reminds me of my mother and my father. They were guiding lights in my life, each in their own special way. Those lights remain lit in memory; they bond me to them across the vast expanse of time.  

Inspired. Inspirert in Norwegian. I find inspiration in writing. Writing inspires me to want to write more. I hope I am reasonably good at it; I don't attempt to measure my success in the traditional ways--money and fame. They don't inspire me to write. I am inspired to write by someone like Georgia O' Keefe who wrote: 

“Whether you succeed or not is irrelevant, there is no such thing. Making your unknown known is the important thing--and keeping the unknown always beyond you.”

I find inspiration in the writings of others--favorite authors whose words have shown me different aspects of life, who have shown me the underbelly and the beauty of life, the sadness and the joy of life, who have described life's mysteries without solving them. I am inspired by the creativity of others, be they writers, artists, actors, filmmakers, bakers, gardeners, parents--by any person who makes his or her unknown known. Creativity is the experience of bringing something into existence; anything that nurtures that is light-filled and inspirational. Creativity inspires more creativity. I remain fascinated by for example, the creativity of putting a record album together as Pink Floyd did with Dark Side of the Moon. I watched a documentary about how that album was made, and awestruck is the only word that begins to describe the feeling of watching a creativity unfold that nearly reached perfection. I would go so far as to call it a divinely-inspired album--one of my favorites. 

Liberated. Frigjort in Norwegian. Strange (but nice) that this word should be one of the three mantra words, since I was recently liberated from the standard work world when I retired at the end of August. Liberated is a perfect way to describe the feeling of being free from the expectations of an employer, and a perfect way to describe the feeling of being free from the constraints of workplaces defined by trendy buzzwords, concepts, unnecessary changes and a host of other factors that in the long run did nothing but irritate me. Retirement is liberation from one type of life and a liberation into another kind of life--one of one's choosing. The feeling of freedom is inviting after over forty years of following the wishes, plans, and strategies of others. There is nothing wrong with the latter, but at some point it's nice to be able to freely choose to follow your own wishes, dreams, ideas and plans. 



Saturday, December 22, 2018

The man who captured divine light in his paintings

Thomas Kinkade's paintings capture light in a way that no other paintings manage to do, at least the paintings I have seen up to this point in my life. There is absolutely something divine about that light and the feelings it creates in the viewer. The closest I can come to adequately describing his paintings is that they portray a vision of heaven, a vision that I can relate to--coming home, the feeling of belonging somewhere (inclusive), family, love, warmth, spirituality, inspiration, joy, and pastoral settings that are all about peace. They tap into a universal longing in us all--the longing to be a part of an all-encompassing love as felt in that light, and to feel that peace; they are divinely-inspired. Perhaps the artist felt that longing as well; his personal life was certainly not as peaceful as the life portrayed in his paintings. Regardless of how Kinkade lived his life, he had a God-given talent that he used well to produce some beautiful paintings. He did not hide 'his light under a bushel basket'. His critics have accused him of being overly-sentimental, among other things, but I don't agree with them. I don't find his paintings sentimental, I find them to be spiritually-influenced visualizations of how life could be, and perhaps that is what the artist both longed for and wished to impart.
















Friday, March 30, 2018

More plays of light and reflections

Inspired by my previous post, and acknowledging that we are now in the season of light, I looked back over some of the photos I have taken during the past few years, where the plays of light caught my photographer's eye. I love looking at the different patterns created by sunlight reflecting off different objects, or created with other sources of light. 









Sunday, April 20, 2014

Quotes about Light and Darkness

A Happy Easter to you all!

  • I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. ― Jesus Christ
  • The true contemplative is not one who prepares his mind for a particular message that he wants or expects to hear, but is one who remains empty because he knows that he can never expect to anticipate the words that will transform his darkness into light. He does not even anticipate a special kind of transformation. He does not demand light instead of darkness. He waits on the Word of God in silence, and, when he is answered it is not so much by a word that bursts into his silence. It is by his silence itself, suddenly, inexplicably revealing itself to him as a word of great power, full of the voice of God. ― Thomas Merton
  • It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness. ― Peter Benenson
  • Look at how a single candle can both defy and define the darkness. ― Anne Frank
  • When you light a candle, you also cast a shadow. ― Ursula K. Le Guin
  • How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a weary world. ― William Shakespeare
  • It may be that you are not yourself luminous, but that you are a conductor of light. Some people without possessing genius have a remarkable power of stimulating it. ― Arthur Conan Doyle
  • Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.  ― Martin Luther King Jr.
  • We've all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the part we choose to act on. That's who we really are. ― J.K. Rowling
  • Fear can only grow in darkness. Once you face fear with light, you win. ― Steve Maraboli
  • Love is not consolation. It is light. ― Simone Weil
  • Light, Light, The visible reminder of Invisible Light. ― T.S. Eliot
  • You have to find what sparks a light in you so that you in your own way can illuminate the world. ― Oprah Winfrey
  • Most of us are imprisoned by something. We're living in darkness until something flips on the switch. ― Wynonna Judd
  • But hope is no less realistic than despair. It is still our choice whether to live in light or lie down in darkness.  ― Rick Yancey
  • Love is a weapon of Light, and it has the power to eradicate all forms of darkness. That is the key. When we offer love even to our enemies, we destroy their darkness and hatred... ― Yehuda Berg
  • Anxiously you ask, 'Is there a way to safety? Can someone guide me? Is there an escape from threatened destruction?' The answer is a resounding yes! I counsel you: Look to the lighthouse of the Lord. There is no fog so dense, no night so dark, no gale so strong, no mariner so lost but what its beacon light can rescue. It beckons through the storms of life. It calls, 'This way to safety; this way to home. ― Thomas S. Monson

Thursday, December 26, 2013

What Pope Francis said about light, and some other quotes about light

I am inspired by what the new pope focuses on and what he stands for. He is seventy-seven years old, and I only hope that he will live a long time so that the Catholic church can undergo the renewal that it sorely needs. Sometimes when I watch him or read about what he has said, I wonder if we are not witnessing a miracle within an (imperfect) man happening before our eyes. He does not strike me at all as a false person. 

In my post yesterday, I wrote that I wanted to focus in 2014 on lighting one candle as the better way rather than cursing the darkness. It is so easy to get discouraged and to give up. But today at Christmas mass, my heart felt free and released from worry (a seldom occurrence in these days of work stress). My heart felt light, both in the sense of being illuminated but also of being lighter in weight. And then I read the news online that the new pope had called Jesus "the light who brightens the darkness" in his Christmas sermon. And I thought that maybe that's what I felt this morning at mass. 

The pope also said that "there are both bright and dark moments, lights and shadows", and that "if our hearts are closed, if we are dominated by pride, deceit, self-seeking, then darkness falls within us and around us." It all somehow made sense to me in that way when you suddenly 'understand'. And then I thought that I would try to find some other quotes about light, because this morning, for me, it was as though a light switch got turned on again inside of me. And that feeling has not left me today at all. 

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.” ― Martin Luther King Jr.

“There is a crack in everything.
That's how the light gets in.”  ― Leonard Cohen

“How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a weary world.” ― William Shakespeare

“There are darknesses in life and there are lights, and you are one of the lights, the light of all lights.”
― Bram Stoker

“As we work to create light for others, we naturally light our own way.”
― Mary Anne Radmacher

“Fear can only grow in darkness. Once you face fear with light, you win.”
― Steve Maraboli

“I've learned recently to love imperfection a lot because it shines such a big light on God's grace. And if someone has grace for you that's when you feel their love the most and they see you for who you are and they love you anyway.”
― Lacey Mosley

“Love is not consolation. It is light.”
― Simone Weil

“You have to find what sparks a light in you so that you in your own way can illuminate the world.”
― Oprah Winfrey

“Because I was more often happy for other people, I got to spend more time being happy. And as I saw more light in everybody else, I seemed to have more myself.”
― Victoria Moran

“My first memory is of light -- the brightness of light -- light all around.”
― Georgia O'Keeffe

Sunday, March 11, 2012

Tunnel of Light at the Nydalen Metro Station in Oslo

Lovely day in Oslo today, so I went for a long walk up along the Akerselva River, as far as Nydalen. I had my camera with me and decided to take a short video of the Nydalen Metro Station's Tunnel of Light. You can see it in action and read more about it here. But I'll include the info about it anyway. Enjoy!!


The Tunnel of Light is located at the Nydalen Metro Station in Oslo, Norway, You step on to the escalator that connects to the station platform, and for 30 seconds you can experience a tunnel of rainbow colors that shift color constantly; the sound patterns ("music") also change along with the lights. The station was designed by architect Kristin Jarmund, and the interactive installations were created by Intravision System.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Ideas in the darkness and in the light of day


The best time for planning a book is while you’re doing the dishes.
— Agatha Christie

If Agatha Christie said this, then it is not so difficult for budding writers (like myself) to admit the same. I think of all the times when I’m doing housework, and ideas pop into my head, and I make a mental note to write them down before they just flit away into the vast cosmos. I wonder if there is a world somewhere—the world of lost ideas. I wonder if there is a way of entering that world, in order to retrieve some of the ideas that got away. Because they do slip away if you don’t catch them when they first appear. Many of them appear while doing mundane chores. But many of them come vividly to life in the darkness. How many times I lie awake at around 5am and ideas rush into my head, and I ponder each of them, turning them over and over in my mind. Can this work? Can I write about that? How will I develop this or that character? Should I do so? And so on. Some of the ideas don’t pass muster in the light of day. It’s odd what the early morning darkness will do for your creativity. Some of the ideas are wild, fantastical, and completely irrational—but they are exciting to think about because there is an element of dare and bravado to them; that can disappear in the waking light. My mind is somehow braver in the dark, and it is an aspect of me that I don’t understand. This can also be true for finding solutions to problems—personal or otherwise. I come up with such wonderful solutions in the dark—things I’m going to say (and mean), decisions that will be irrevocable--the new me with a tough no-nonsense attitude. I come up with quips and sarcastic retorts to rude people and can plan out my replies to those who like to talk over me when I try and speak. And then the dawn breaks and in the light of day I’m not so tough. I have to struggle to be brave and to remember my promises to myself made in the dark. And it is the same with writing. The ideas are there--hundreds of ideas. I don’t lack for ideas for what to write about. The problem is choosing the one idea I want to focus on. The ideas have probably been there for years, inside of me, waiting for an opening. Sitting down and actually writing about them releases them, expands them, solidifies them and makes them real. But in the darkness they all seem so viable. In the light, they are not. In fact, some of them can seem quite ridiculous.

I try to pay attention to my inner voice, the one that tells me what path is probably best to follow these days. My heart is in accord with this inner voice. So I have often experienced that my inner voice tells me to have several projects going at one time—I work a little on one of them during one week, and then suddenly the following week, my inner voice suggests that I focus on another project. I don’t know if it is like this for other writers. For example, I am currently working on a book of short stories and a science fiction novel, but the book that is ready to go at present is a book of reflections about workplaces and the work world that I’ve been mulling over for the last month or so. Most of the essays and reflections that make up the book were written during the past two years, but it is the actual compilation of these that took some time. How best to present them, which ones should come first--that sort of thing. It all fell into place, and once again I marvel at the creative process. I understand so little of it, but it is so exhilarating to experience. The freedom associated with it is like nothing I have ever experienced before, and once you taste that freedom, you will not trade it away for anything. 

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Times Square at night

Times Square in New York City has really changed during the past twenty years or so. It used to be a seedy, dirty, and unattractive area of Manhattan, but no longer. I was there for a few days in April 2009 when I visited New York for my high school reunion and I stayed in Manhattan for a few nights. I was together with a good friend and we walked around Times Square one evening--a particularly clear and lovely night. I took a lot of photos (as always). The medley of sights, sounds, colors, and shapes appeals to the eye. If it is possible to say that advertising can be beautiful in its own way, then that is definitely the case for Times Square. I love the light shows that advertise everything from candy to electronics to beer. I am sure that advertising agencies have understood the power of color and lights to sell their products against the backdrop of the dark sky. In any case, it all makes for some really cool photos. And I can again say (like the famous commercial)--"I love New York--there is no place like it." Enjoy!













Thursday, February 3, 2011

Patterns and light




















This is a ceiling in a Paris department store that was spectacular to look up at. Very elegant, stylish, lovely. Love the patterns and the light coming through........

The world we live in

 A little humor to brighten your day from one of my favorite comic strips-- Non Sequitur .......