Last week my family and I had the privilege of nestling down in a cozy house in Castle Valley, Utah.  If you haven’t heard, this place is completely tremendous!!  I entertained myself marveling at the shifting light over the amphitheater of mountains, mesas, red rock and cliffs.  Morning light waned west and the evening light waxed east, turning a simple show of sun and stone into a palpable pleasure.  I cased the light, eagles and trees branches with my camera, quoted humbled, grateful.  Blessed by the simple and strong gift of overwhelming natural beauty.

Though I did not see her when I was there, I hear the western writer Terry Tempest Williams resides in this amazing place.  She lets herself be spoken to, moved and taught by this place, in a way I only got to dip my toes into and what these mountains have told her leave me wanting more…..So appropriately here are some of her words to go with the images I gathered there.

“In the desert there is space. Space is the twin sister of time. If we have open space then we have open time to breath, to dream, to dare, to play, to pray to move freely, so freely, in a world our minds have forgotten but our bodies remember. Time and space. This partnership is holy. In these redrock canyons, time creates space–an arch, an eye, this blue eye of sky. We remember why we love the desert; it is our tactile response to light, to silence, and to stillness.”
― Terry Tempest Williams, Red: Passion and Patience in the Desert

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“I pray to the birds because they remind me of what I love rather than what I fear. And at the end of my prayers, they teach me how to listen.”
― Terry Tempest Williams, Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place

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“Is this the curse of modernity, to live in a world without judgment, without perspective, no context for understanding or distinguishing what is real and what is imagined, what is manipulated and what is by chance beautiful, what is shadow and what is flesh?”
― Terry Tempest Williams

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“Faith is not about finding meaning in the world, there may be no such thing — faith is the belief in our capacity to create meaningful lives.”
― Terry Tempest Williams, Leap

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“A shadow is never created in darkness. It is born of light. We can be blind to it and blinded by it. Our shadow asks us to look at what we don’t want to see”
― Terry Tempest Williams, When Women Were Birds: Fifty-four Variations on Voice

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“The Eyes of the Future are looking back at us and they are praying for us to see beyond our own time.”
― Terry Tempest Williams, Red: Passion and Patience in the Desert

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“Finding beauty in a broken world is creating beauty in the world we find.”
― Terry Tempest Williams

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“For far too long we have been seduced into walking a path that did not lead us to ourselves. For far too long we have said yes when we wanted to say no. And for far too long we have said no when we desperately wanted to say yes. . . .

When we don’t listen to our intuition, we abandon our souls. And we abandon our souls because we are afraid if we don’t, others will abandon us.”
― Terry Tempest Williams, When Women Were Birds: Fifty-four Variations on Voice