the quiet bell

This bell hangs in a tree at the lakeside spot where my son likes to play. We don't know who placed it there or why. My husband lifts our son up where he can hold onto a tree branch and move the bell. It chimes very softly. It can barely be heard among all the other sounds of the neighborhood. We've become so fond of this little, inexplicably-placed, bell. We look for it every time to make sure it's still there.

I'm feeling a lot like the bell, these days. I'm overwhelmed by all the sound around me. Or, rather, maybe it's that I want to be like the bell. I want a leafy divide between me and all that out there. I want to be a quiet sound. I want to hold a quiet space and welcome others into it as they may come upon it.

I'm still wrestling with a daily practice. I know that it would cultivate the silence, stillness, hush and open me to hear the still small voice. I don't understand my resistance. Do I need to? May I just not figure it all out? & yield to a mystery?