{"id":4467,"date":"2026-07-19T06:02:27","date_gmt":"2026-07-19T06:02:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/?p=4467"},"modified":"2026-07-10T06:06:06","modified_gmt":"2026-07-10T06:06:06","slug":"the-path-is-a-gritty-teacher","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/?p=4467","title":{"rendered":"The path is a gritty teacher"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p1\">The way is calling me to take of my shoes,<br \/>\nnot to humble me,<br \/>\n<span class=\"s2\">but to keep me honest<br \/>\nabout the distance between what i believe<br \/>\nand what I am willing to feel.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">So I walk barefoot,<br \/>\nand the dust rises to meet me,<br \/>\nsmall circles lifting with every step,<br \/>\nhanging a moment in the light<br \/>\nbefore they fall,<br \/>\ndancing not because they mean to,<br \/>\nbut because motion is the only way<br \/>\ndust knows how to pray.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">The sole learns before the soul does.<br \/>\nA stone presses its hard truth<br \/>\ninto the part of me that touches earth,<br \/>\nand I embrace the grit because some things are only understood from underneath.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">I am not walking toward enlightenment.<br \/>\nI am wearing it into the arches of my feet,<br \/>\nthe outer path and the inner ache<br \/>\nrubbing against each other<br \/>\nuntil they become one.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">Remember you are dust, someone once said,<br \/>\nand so I seek oneness with this least regarded thing.<br \/>\nDust whispers catch the light and turn,<br \/>\nwe trace a shape across the road<br \/>\nslowly settles together we become part of the path.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">The path does not reward the ones who grip it hardest.<br \/>\nso let your hands go loose,<br \/>\nstop carrying the map like a cross<br \/>\nand feel the weight carrying nothing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">There is grace in this dust, this path and in each step,<br \/>\n<\/span>Let each step rise and settle<br \/>\n<span class=\"s2\">Let the path rise and fall<br \/>\n<\/span><span class=\"s2\">Let the dust dance and rest<br \/>\nuntil it is a single liturgy and the sole and soul become one.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The way is calling me to take of my shoes, not to humble me, but to keep me honest about the distance between what i believe and what I am willing to feel. So I walk barefoot, and the dust &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/?p=4467\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,115],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4467","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-misc","category-walls-to-dust"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4467","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4467"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4467\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4468,"href":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4467\/revisions\/4468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sundaypapers.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}