If God is beyond our understanding, impossible to describe or define and always overflowing the limits of even our most elevated thought, it might seem that we can only speak with imprecise, vague, misty ideas and concepts.

But paradoxically, the best metaphors for the spiritual life, the ones that communicate most clearly and directly, are often the ones drawn from the concrete things we see around us every day, bikes, flowers, violin strings, clouds, monkeys, wavelengths, paddling a canoe, coming home. These are the sort of images Liz selects to clarify our understanding of what we are doing when we meditate.