{"id":139,"date":"2011-04-14T16:00:20","date_gmt":"2011-04-14T20:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/insweetcompany\/?p=139"},"modified":"2011-04-14T16:00:20","modified_gmt":"2011-04-14T20:00:20","slug":"an-invitation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/04\/an-invitation.html","title":{"rendered":"An Invitation"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cIn every relationship, we have a choice: to choose love or separation, to choose for love or to choose for hate or fear.\u201d<\/em> — Margaret Wheatley, IN SWEET COMPANY: CONVERSATIONS WITH EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN ABOUT LIVING A SPIRITUAL LIFE<\/p>\n

Lately, almost everyone I know is up to their eyeballs in some expression of chaos. The world has sped UP! Big time! What manifests on the macro level as wars and earthquakes and near-government shut downs manifests on a micro level in our own lives: We battle, we rattle, and we power down. Oui?<\/p>\n

Eastern philosophy talks about the chaos as being part of an eternal cycle of creation, preservation, and destruction. This cycle — the notion that things change, that nothing is permanent — comforts me. It helps me put the chaos in perspective, helps me manage it; to see it not only as temporary, but to understand the way new beginnings rise from the ashes of rude endings. When I reduce events to a point in the cycle, I more easily stand above them. Sometimes, if I\u2019m lucky, I see them through God\u2019s eyes.<\/p>\n

There is a wonderful poem by the Persian mystic Hafiz, called \u201cDivine Invitation,\u201d\u00a0 that I sometimes read when I am roiling that helps me remember I can choose how I respond to the turbulence around or within me. I share it with you now:<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have been invited to meet<\/em>
\nThe Friend.<\/em>
\nNo one can resist a Divine Invitation.<\/em>
\nThat narrows down all our choices<\/em>
\nTo just two:<\/em>
\nWe can come to God<\/em>
\nDressed for Dancing,<\/em>
\nOr<\/em>
\nBe carried on a stretcher<\/em>
\nTo God’s Ward.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Your thoughts?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cIn every relationship, we have a choice: to choose love or separation, to choose for love or to choose for hate or fear.\u201d — Margaret Wheatley, IN SWEET COMPANY: CONVERSATIONS WITH EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN ABOUT LIVING A SPIRITUAL LIFE Lately, almost everyone I know is up to their eyeballs in some expression of chaos. The world…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":231,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,1],"tags":[31,33,30,32,29,28],"class_list":["post-139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal-transformation","category-spiritual-journey","tag-chaos","tag-choice","tag-eastern-philosophy","tag-hafiz","tag-margaret-wheatley","tag-uplifting-quotes"],"yoast_head":"\nAn Invitation - In Sweet Company<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/04\/an-invitation.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"An Invitation - In Sweet Company\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u201cIn every relationship, we have a choice: to choose love or separation, to choose for love or to choose for hate or fear.\u201d — Margaret Wheatley, IN SWEET COMPANY: CONVERSATIONS WITH EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN ABOUT LIVING A SPIRITUAL LIFE Lately, almost everyone I know is up to their eyeballs in some expression of chaos. The world…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/04\/an-invitation.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"In Sweet Company\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-04-14T20:00:20+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Margaret Wolff\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"An Invitation - In Sweet Company","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/04\/an-invitation.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"An Invitation - In Sweet Company","og_description":"\u201cIn every relationship, we have a choice: to choose love or separation, to choose for love or to choose for hate or fear.\u201d — Margaret Wheatley, IN SWEET COMPANY: CONVERSATIONS WITH EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN ABOUT LIVING A SPIRITUAL LIFE Lately, almost everyone I know is up to their eyeballs in some expression of chaos. The world…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/04\/an-invitation.html","og_site_name":"In Sweet Company","article_published_time":"2011-04-14T20:00:20+00:00","author":"Margaret Wolff","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/04\/an-invitation.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/04\/an-invitation.html","name":"An Invitation - In Sweet Company","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/#website"},"datePublished":"2011-04-14T20:00:20+00:00","dateModified":"2011-04-14T20:00:20+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/#\/schema\/person\/9e1d77d12de19dd0d4fbc84d1f7fc52a"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/04\/an-invitation.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/04\/an-invitation.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/2011\/04\/an-invitation.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"An Invitation"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/","name":"In Sweet Company","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Margaret Wolff","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/#\/schema\/person\/9e1d77d12de19dd0d4fbc84d1f7fc52a","name":"Margaret Wolff","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/673\/67331f0571f27a0987e8cbfde3e832b4x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/673\/67331f0571f27a0987e8cbfde3e832b4x96.jpg","caption":"Margaret Wolff"},"description":"Margaret Wolff has a gift of luring people into becoming who they really are. She speaks and writes about things women care about: how to make our lives and our work be about what we value most; how to navigate challenge and change; how to live with integrity and grace, to look at error in ourselves and others in a forgiving way and view life as an invitation to transform ourselves into instruments for the Greater Good. \"I laughed, I cried, I was silent, I cheered. Most of all, I loved.\" Spoken by a woman at In Sweet Company Retreat, these words express what women experience when Margaret engages them in dynamic, soul-searching conversations about their lives. Margaret holds degrees in art therapy, psychosynthesis, and leadership and human behavior. Her work takes her to universities, to conferences and retreat settings, to living rooms and board rooms -- wherever women gather. Her articles, essays, and stories are featured in numerous magazines; her women\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s spirituality retreats are held throughout the U.S. Margaret\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s last book, In \"Sweet Company: Conversations With Extraordinary Women About Living a Spiritual Life\" (Jossey Bass), is a collection of intimate conversations she had with 14 famous women of various ages, faiths, and backgrounds about how their spirituality nourishes them and serves as a steady compass for their decision-making. Olympia Dukakis, Riane Eisler, Zainab Salbi, Margaret Wheatley, Sri Daya Mata, Lauren Artress, and other women artists, activists, religious leaders, and visionary thinkers shared their lives with her. You can too!","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/author\/mwolff"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/231"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":140,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139\/revisions\/140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/insweetcompany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}