Playing with the Light

This time of year is one of settling in, learning routines, and forging new friendships.  Although it’s officially still summer, we have big hopes for cooler weather.  These days teachers have to be extra creative to provide the lingering summer energy levels a productive channel of expression.  While we adjust to a new school year and begin to fill the blank walls with works of art, there is a beautiful space available to receive that which is new.  Each day brings breakthroughs great and small, and if I keep my eyes wide open I can see the pieces that start to form this new way of being together.  One example was our two-year-olds working at the light table on Friday.

The table is just the right height for a young child to stand beside and the entire surface is illuminated by a light source underneath.  Brightly colored transparent shapes scattered on the table’s surface were thoughtfully transformed by small hands into towers and designs.  It was  impressive how calm and focused those young children were as they played quietly with the light.  Down the hall, a child who was initially challenged by learning the ways of school stood beaming by his teacher, holding up what he brought to show his classmates for his sharing day.  Often on a child’s sharing day, he or she is also the designated line leader.  Not long after the sharing moment I observed the same child miraculously and successfully leading his class down the hall, light radiating from his eyes and smiling face.

I’ve noticed the presence of light around the Seed everywhere I look, more so this year than ever before.  It manifests in small kindnesses between teacher and parent, in conversations of deep listening, in helpful clean-up without being asked.  I see the light when new parents tell their stories and returning families pitch in to be inclusive.  I notice it in the faces of alumni students who proudly return to their Seed roots, and in the children themselves as they hold hands with a friend walking down the hall.

The light is playful and happy.  It’s what builds a community, heals broken hearts and shines forth hope for an inspiring tomorrow.  The interesting thing is the more you pause to notice it, the more it starts showing up everywhere.  As I was looking for a reading for my yoga class on Saturday morning, I found this passage from Hafiz:

“Children can easily open the drawer that lets spirit rise up and wear its favorite costume of mirth and laughter.  When the mind is consumed with remembrance of grace, something divine happens to the heart that shapes the hand and tongue and eye into the word Love.”

I couldn’t have said it better.  What an honor it is to spend my days among so many who daily play with the light.