Lynne with Ms. Dantes in Early 90’s
Welcome to all of us who are here today to share our experiences with Ms Dantes.
This is an honor for me to share my life experience with Ms Dantes. She has been an important part of my life since I met her in the mid-eighties. I was first introduced to her as many of you may have been . . . at a dialogue at someone’s home. I was moved by and drawn to her gentleness, honesty and clear insight. It was refreshing. I believe the universe provides what we need to flower. We just have to have our eyes open enough to see it. And as the expression goes, “smell the roses’”, which are one of Ms Dantes favorite flowers.
I was fortunate to be one of her “students” and eventually a volunteer with the Ligia Dantes Foundation and the Helen & Stuart Over, M.D. Center for Holistic Living. Ms Dantes was a living example of loving kindness and compassion and of true service to humanity. So as students we were given the opportunity to practice being of service by planning & volunteering at various dialogues and retreats, such as, the silent meditation retreats at Casa de Maria in Montecito. We were asked to put aside our own preferences and think in terms of what was best for the whole and how we could best be of service. And we were also asked to contribute in unfamiliar ways so we could explore our edges, so to speak.
And it was at a retreat in 1996 that I found this card with one of Sister Corita Kent’s simple, elegant designs & Ralph Waldo Emerson’s words. “You taught my lips a single speech and a thousand silences.” It reminded me of Ms Dantes so I bought it to give on her birthday. After she passed I was helping to sort through her estate & papers & found the card. And this is what I wrote on Nov 24, 1996 on her 67th birthday.
Dear Ligia,
My love is with you on this day of celebration of your life and all the days to follow. “Life” gave you and your generous and abundant LOVE to all—those in your presence and beyond. The “single speech” you gave to me was LOVE & PEACE are mine to have and to give to all the world—open to what IS. And in Silence we may experience the ALL.
Thank-you dear One,
Lynne
A true teacher is one who gives their students the tools, the means to wisdom, and the opportunities to practice and explore, to inquire, so they discover the truth of who they are—so they become whole. The tools were Meditation / Inquiry / Awareness / Silence / Presence (Breath). Ms Dantes was a loving, clear reflection and encouraged all who were in her presence to bloom into their own unique flower.
And now I’m here again, this time with you as well, to celebrate her life. Her spirit is free to soar throughout the Cosmos now, but her legacy lives on in all she touched, and in the many ways she served others throughout her life. Namaste, Ms Dantes . . . .