The Invitation

The Invitation
By Oriah Mountain Dreamer
Canadian Teacher and Author
It doesn’t interest me what you do for a living
I want to know what you ache for
and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart’s longing.
It doesn’t interest me how old you are
I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool
for love
for your dreams
for the adventure of being alive.
It doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon…
I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow
if you have been opened by life’s betrayals
or have become shrivelled and closed
from fear of further pain.
I want to know if you can sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.
I want to know if you can be with joy
Mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your
fingers and toes
without cautioning us to
be careful
be realistic
to remember the limitations of being human.
It doesn’t interest me if the story you are telling me
is true.
I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to yourself.
If you can bear the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.
I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.
I want to know if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand on the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
“Yes.”
It doesn’t interest me
to know where you live or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after a night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.
It doesn’t interest me who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the center of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.
It doesn’t interest me where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.
I want to know if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like the company you keep
in the empty moments.

  Thank you to Beth of Be Yourself…Everyone Else is taken
for letting me steal this.

14 thoughts on “The Invitation”

  1. Hmmmm – I thought you stole it from ME! I posted it on facebook last September! LOVE this poem. My favorite poem from all time. Glad you connected with it regardless!

  2. That's what bloggy friends are for. To inspire enough to make a friend want to borrow their words. With permission of course. 🙂

    Di

  3. This is one of my favorites 🙂 When we fought the great flood in 2009, I first saw this and it totally spoke to me at a time when busloads of people from all walks of life arrived in our neighborhood to sand bag and help save our homes…

  10. Hi Remington here! Your friend told me about you. So I thought I would stop on by…. You have a great blog! Love the poem. I hope we can be great friends.

  11. How funny…this is one of my favorite sayings – be yourself, everyone else is already taken! I used it just a little while ago…again.
    I'm living my dream and am blessed well beyond my deserving.
    Thank God.

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