You are responsible for the energy you bring to those around you.I really like that. Notice what it does not say. It does not say that we are responsible for how other people feel. We can't take that on, really, (although others may try to manipulate us into believing we can or should). We do, however, have some real choice about what we contribute to the atmosphere around us.
“Mindfulness is not an evasion or an escape. It means being here, present, and totally alive. It is true freedom—and without this freedom, there is no happiness.”
Brandon Heinz, an eighth grader in the Bristol Township School District, told occupational therapist Charles E. Gallagher that he had been asked to sit still "millions of times."The problem is that it's not always easy.
For Brandon, 14, and his classmates - students with autism, attention-deficit disorders, or other special needs - controlling signs of anxiety is often a struggle.
So Gallagher made a suggestion: Breathe.
"In through your nose, and out through your mouth," he instructed. Then, he said, let out a big sigh.
Gallagher went on to teach the students meditation techniques to help them cope when frustration threatens to overwhelm.
No, this doesn't mean not to plan. We need to live in the moment - not necessarily for the moment. (There's a difference.) We can, however, be thoroughly in the moment while we're making sensible plans for the future - letting the planning be an act of responsibility and not an obsession.Present-moment living, getting in touch with your now, is at the heart of effective living. When you think about it, there really is no other moment you can live. Now is all there is, and the future is just another present moment to live when it arrives.
-- Wayne Dyer
You know, I come across people who actually seem to boast of impatience or, at the very least, vigorously justify it. Now that I think about it, they weren't very peaceful sorts at all....Inner peace is letting go of impatience.
There's so much beauty around you--and not just where one conventionally would look for beauty. In a flower, of course it's there supremely, but even in places you would not be looking for it.
If there is love, there is hope to have real families, real brotherhood, real equanimity, real peace. If the love within your mind is lost, if you continue to see other beings as enemies, then no matter how much knowledge or education you have, no matter how much material progress is made, only suffering and confusion will ensue.
People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.
Odd that I had not come across it before but I haven't. It's so wonderful that I would have thought it would be picked up more often in a variety of books and websites on the spiritual life.“Enlightenment is not imagining figures of light but making the darkness conscious.”
When we see ourselves in a situation which must be endured and gone through, it is best to meet it with firmness, and accommodate everything to it in the best way practicable. This lessens the evil, while fretting and fuming only increase your own torments.
-- Thomas Jefferson
Wisdom comes with the ability to be still. Just look and just listen. No more is needed. Being still, looking, and listening activates the non-conceptual intelligence within you. Let stillness direct your words and actions.
Meditation invites us to stop, just stop, breathe and be. Just as with a musician playing or an artist painting, when we stop trying to make it happen something occurs, like the radiant sun that suddenly emerges in a cloudy sky. But because we try so hard, we identify more with the technique instead of allowing the meditation to reveal itself.Many people get frustrated with meditation because they're striving for some sort of idealized technique that will produce a certain feeling. I like the encourage simply to stop, to breathe and to be.
What saves a person is to take a step. Then another step.
Yup. As I often find myself saying in the Foundations class, "Notice the non-objectivity of perception."What we observe is not nature itself, but nature exposed to our method of questioning.
Most people rarely give thought to the effect they have had or will have on others. When we take a few moments to contemplate how our individual modes of being affect the people we spend time with each day, we come one step closer to seeing ourselves through the eyes of others. By asking ourselves whether those we encounter walk away feeling appreciated, respected, and liked, we can heighten our awareness of the effect we ultimately have. Something as simple as a smile given freely can temporarily brighten a person’s entire world... And small gestures of kindness can even prove to those embittered by the world that goodness still exists.The complete article is right here.
A person may seem to be silent, but if his heart is condemning others, he is babbling ceaselessly. But there may be another who talks from morning till night and yet he is truly silent, that is, he says nothing that is not profitable.
-- Abba Pimen
A wise woman who was traveling in the mountains found a precious stone in a stream. The next day she met another traveler who was hungry, and the wise woman opened her bag to share her food. The hungry traveler saw the precious stone and asked the woman to give it to him. She did so without hesitation. The traveler left, rejoicing in his good fortune. He knew the stone was worth enough to give him security for a lifetime. But a few days later he came back to return the stone to the wise woman."I've been thinking," he said, "I know how valuable the stone is, but I give it back in the hope that you can give me something even more precious. Give me what you have within you that enabled you to give me the stone.
-- Author Unknown
Meditation, of course, is the most effective way of resting the mind. My own teacher used to say that frequently: "Rest the mind; rest the mind." If we are straining in any way when we meditated, we truly aren't doing it correctly.Sometimes the most urgent and vital thing you can possibly do is take a complete rest.
Schweitzer has long been one of my personal heroes. If you don't know much about him, I really recommend that you read up on this life and work.Truth has no special time of its own. Its hour is now - always.
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