Serenity

I observe such enormous suffering when people refuse to accept what is:

"What is the secret of your serenity?"
Said the Master, "Wholehearted cooperation with the inevitable."

-- Anthony de Mello

How true. How very true.

Temporarily out of commission

Greetings to all my readers.

The computer guru has taken my computer away for the time being and so I'm a bit hampered in getting the usual posting done.

Check back on Friday evening. I'm hoping I'll have it back by then!

May everyone have peace and happiness.

Something worth pondering

Take a look:

Loving people live in a loving world.
Hostile people live in a hostile world.
Same world.

-- Wayne Dyer

Monday meditative picture blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Put downs

A dear friend of the Center, Larry H., wrote the following:

What is the appropriate way to respond to put downs? Someone calls you a jerk or worse uses a profanity in name-calling. Perhaps one describes my behavior with sweeping generalizations, such as, "You always yell at me when I ask you to do something for me." Tempting as it is to fight fire with fire and return with similar name-calling or accusation, it may be more effective to ignore rude behavior or to respond by bringing attention to the feeling expressed by the individual issuing the put-down. Isn't it true that people who don't respect themselves frequently project those negative feelings onto others? My favorite reply to name-calling is the reply I've borrowed from Peewee Herman, namely, "I'm one, but what are you?" That may not make total sense, but at least it identifies what the other person is doing and simultaneously takes me off the hook for a response to the attempted insult. The Greek Stoic philosopher, Epictetus, also had a clever way to handle put downs. He said, “If you hear that someone is speaking ill of you, instead of trying to defend yourself you should say: "He obviously does not know me very well, since there are so many other faults he could have mentioned."

I personally have received much benefit from reading Epictetus. There's a little book of his sayings called The Enchiridion that I highly recommend.
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A skillful way of looking at time

When I was in the convent, we were taught to experience each day as a lifetime. We went to sleep as if it were our death and woke up each morning as if it were rebirth. The following expresses the same basic idea:

I do not cut my life up into days but my days into lives, each day, each hour, an entire life.

- Juan Ramon Jimenez

Learning how to be happy

Ya just gotta click through on this one:

6 Ways Your Dog Can Teach You to Live a Happier Life

Here's a sample:

Live life to the fullest. Watch your dog as he goes through his day. Every scent is new and different, every person is special and every morsel of food is to be savored. That's how you should be living your life. Even if you do the same things every day, find a new way of doing them.

The others are good as well!
~~~

Friday cat blogging!

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Something about impermanence

"Who are YOU?" said the Caterpillar. This was not an encouraging opening for a conversation.

Alice replied, rather shyly, "I--I hardly know, sir, just at present-- at least I know who I WAS when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then."

-- Lewis Carroll from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

The best response to greed ever

Just look:

We are here to add what we can to, not to get what we can from, life.

-- Sir William Osler

I think this approach simply does not occur to a lot of people. Our consumer-oriented society reinforces in people the assumption that they ought to get what they can from life. It occurs to me that Osler's approach is much, much more fulfilling.
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Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Something about simplification

Here's a headline that caught my attention and that I really like:

How to Simplify When You Love Your Stuff

Here's just a little excerpt:

But let’s be real here. In spite of embracing the concept of simplicity, most people really love their stuff, and they love acquiring more stuff. Like our attitudes about a healthy diet, our feelings about material things are complicated. We know what’s good for us, but we just don’t want to give up what we like. Our stuff makes us feel good.

Is it possible to live a simple life and still love stuff? How much letting go of stuff really counts toward simplifying anyway?

I'd like to recommend that you click through and read the article. There are some guidelines about buying new things that are truly helpful.
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A very touching observation

This moved me very much when I found it:

Some of the shells that wash up on the beach were once very beautiful. We don't know what kind of journey they had to take to get them in their fragile condition. The same is true for people. Be kind.

-- Linda Gifford

The "parent" of all virtues

This morning I took a look at a Care 2 article on gratitude. Here's a little excerpt:

The recognition of gratitude as the foundation for a life worth living comes through every ancient civilization. Aesop, the famed Greek fabulist, stated: “Gratitude is the sign of noble souls” and Cicero, the ancient Roman statesmen wrote: “Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all the others.” Yet even with this long standing recognition, there is a great deal of gratitude that goes unsaid. Like a tree that falls in a forest with no one to hear it, is gratitude real that is unshared?

Yes and no, I think. The fleeting grateful thoughts that I have that go unsaid and unrecorded do change something in me momentarily, but they do not really live in my heart and offer their magical balm until I give them away. I think one of the keys to making your soul a noble one through gratitude comes from paying attention to those thoughts. Interrupting your regularly scheduled life to stop and notice whatever is good in front of you and actually take the time to share it.

This is so, so true. Just for today, let's each one of us actively look for ways to be grateful, okay?

~~~

Friday cat blogging!

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Ha!

Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

On not prolonging the torment

Cynthia sent me the following quotation this morning:

“The cow runs away from the storm while the buffalo charges toward it—and gets through it faster. When I'm confronted with a tough challenge, I do not prolong the torment. I become the buffalo.”

— Donna Brazile

It's really a classic meditation principle to go toward the difficulty we experience instead of away from it.
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Why speculation is not all that useful

These two quotations really seem to go together to me. See if you think so too:

"I'm astounded by people who want to 'know' the universe when it's hard enough to find your way around Chinatown."

-- Woody Allen

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"One world at a time."

-- Thoreau, when asked about the hereafter

Monday meditative picture blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

What we think

This is so true and, also, so important:

You may believe that you are responsible for what you do, but not for what you think. The truth is that you are responsible for what you think, because it is only at this level that you can exercise choice. What you do comes from what you think.

-- From 'A Course In Miracles'

"God mend thine every flaw"

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Image courtesy VintageHolidayCrafts.com

I love this last verse from "This is my song, Oh God of all the nations":

May truth and freedom come to every nation

May peace abound where strife has raged so long;

That each may seek to love and build together,

A world united, righting every wrong.

A world united in its love for freedom,

Proclaiming peace together in one song.

The original hymn (sung to the tune Finlandia) was written by Lloyd Stone but that had only two verses. This added verse is by the theologian Georgia Harkness.

Wise words

The following is very much in line with meditative practice and principles:

Realize that true happiness lies within you. Waste no time and effort searching for peace and contentment and joy in the world outside. Remember that there is no happiness in having or in getting, but only in giving. Reach out. Share. Smile. Hug. Happiness is a perfume you cannot pour on others without getting a few drops on yourself.

-- Og Mandino

Friday cat blogging!

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Something ordinary but quite thought provoking

Take a look:

Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind. "Pooh!" he whispered.

"Yes, Piglet?"

"Nothing," said Piglet, taking Pooh's paw; "I just wanted to be sure of you."

-- A.A. Milne

Is there anyone in your life right now who would like to be sure of you? Why not help that process out just a little?
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Soothing, centering

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The photo of the sky at 4:09 is particularly lovely, I think.

Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Different meditation approaches

I just came across a little article entitled "Comprehensive Guide to Worldwide Meditation Techniques". While the piece is not truly comprehensive, it does give some interesting brief descriptions of varying approaches to meditative practice. Here's an example:

Contemplation Meditation Technique: These meditations utilize introspection, self-study, reflection, self-dialogue and contemplation to cut through the layers of false conditioning and false understanding that deludes the mind. These meditations have their roots in many Western Religions and are also a part of Eastern philosophies.

Today's article is Part One. Apparently, a Part Two is on the way and will be published on the same basic site.
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Monday meditative picture blogging

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Photo by Cynthia Burgess

Supporting one's own well being

I found a self-care list today that I believe I almost could have written myself. It's called "10 Simple Ways to Maximize Your Joy". All ten of the suggestions are valuable but I think I'll just give you the third one here as an excerpt:

3. Evaluate your “to do” list. Make a list of ten things you have to do this week. Next perform what I call a body scan. Notice how your body responds when you imagine doing each of these things on your list. Does your body feel tense? Do you feel a pit in your stomach? Focus on the task that brings up the most pain, and ask yourself why you are planning to do this thing that causes you to feel anxious or stressed. If the answer is “I have to,” then you set yourself up to be in a completely helpless position. There are no alternatives when you operate from that principle. If the answer is “I choose to do it because if I don’t it would be morally repulsive,” you come from a more powerful place and one of choice.

Tapping into choice is so very powerful. Try practicing total abstinence for a while from saying "I have to..." and just notice how that changes your experience of anticipating what you are obligated or committed to doing. There's always some choice in the picture. Waking up to the existence of that choice is a way of empowering and showing compassion to ourselves as well as others.
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Sunday art blogging

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Artist: Aksel Waldemar Johannessen

Image from Wikimedia Commons

Understanding how our minds work is important:

The world we have created is a product of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.

-- Albert Einstein

Descartes rules!

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Just click on the image to enlarge!
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Friday cat blogging!

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Just give it a little thought, okay?

Take a look at this interesting headline:

Vegetarians Are Happier Than Meat-Eaters

And here's a little excerpt:

A new study in Nutrition Journal finds vegetarians have lower incidence of depression, anxiety, and other mood problems than their meat-eating neighbors.

You can access more about the study design from the actual Journal right here.

This is, by the way, a peer-reviewed journal.
~~~

Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

More about impermanence

It might well do us all some good to take a look at whatever tends to shock us or upset our equilibrium. Then it would be helpful to ask ourselves if maybe we forgot about impermanence:

[I]mpermanence is the nature of the human condition. This is a truth we know in our minds but tend to resist in our hearts. Change happens all around us, all the time, yet we long for the predictable, the consistent. We want the reassurance that comes from things remaining the same. We find ourselves shocked when people die, even though death is the most predictable part of life.

-- Jack Kornfield

Life choices

I truly am convinced that the more we live as if we have choices, the more choices we actually do end up having. I don't think anyone can put the following pledge into practice one hundred percent but I do think we can make a substantial beginning:

I will not die an unlived life. I will not live in fear of falling or catching fire. I choose to inhabit my days, to allow my living to open me, to make me less afraid, more accessible, to loosen my heart until it becomes a wing, a torch, a promise. I choose to risk my significance; to live so that which comes to me as seed goes to the next as blossom and that which comes to me as blossom, goes on as fruit.

-- Dawna Markova

Happy Summer Solstice, everyone!

Here are several offerings for your contemplation:

"Our fear of death is like our fear that summer will be short, but when we have had our swing of pleasure, our fill of fruit, and our swelter of heat, we say we have had our day."
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"We need society, and we need solitude also, as we need summer and winter, day and night, exercise and rest."
-- Philip Gilbert Hamerton

"Do what we can, summer will have its flies."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time."
-- John Lubbock

"There shall be eternal summer in the grateful heart."
-- Celia Thaxter

"In summer, the song sings itself."
-- William Carlos Williams

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May you all enjoy today's amazing, extented light. Celebrate the earth. And pray for her - however you do so.
~~~

Sunday art blogging

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Image from Wikimedia Commons

The problem with concepts

Concepts are useful but they are to reality the way a map is to the actual terrain itself:

Identification with your mind creates an opaque screen of concepts, labels, images, words, judgments, and definitions that blocks all true relationship. It comes between you and yourself, between you and your fellow man and woman, between you and nature, between you and God. It is this screen of thought that creates the illusion of separateness, the illusion that there is you and a totally separate other. You then forget the essential fact that, underneath the level of physical appearances and separate forms, you are one with all that is.

-- Eckhart Tolle

Friday cat blogging!

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Something about meditation

I discovered Joseph Campbell when I was quite young and I count myself very fortunate indeed to have done so. Here's something he said about the importance of meditation that I like very much:

You must have a room, or a certain hour or so a day, where you don't know what was in the newspaper that morning, you don't know who your friends are, you don't know what you owe anybody, you don't know what anybody owes you. This is a place where you can simply experience and bring forth what you are and what you might be.

Treasuring the ordinary

Quite a number of years ago, a person who was very influential in my monastic formation told me that I needed to learn to be ordinary. I didn't really understand that then but I have a great appreciation for it these days:

Enlightenment is just another word for feeling comfortable with being a completely ordinary person.

-Veronique Vienne

Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Be teachable

If we don't make ourselves receptive to help, how will we learn? And what this says is that it's never too late. I believe that.

It is a mistake for anyone to think he has lived too long in his old, unsatisfactory ways to make the great change. If you switch on the light in a dark room, it makes no difference how long it was dark because the light will still shine. Be teachable. That is the whole secret.

-- Vernon Howard

The five senses and mindfulness

Today I found an interesting website entitled Tiny Buddha: Simple Wisdom for Complex Lives. While browsing around on the site I came across a little article called 5 Rules for Life by Lori Deschene. Here's an excerpt:

See as much as you can of what’s right in front of you.

People often live life caught in two mental strongholds: regret for the past, and worry for the future. In looking back on the years I’ve lived so far, I know I’ve spent more time engaging in those activities than truly being present.

Whenever I catch myself, I check in with my five senses and experience what’s in front of me as fully as I possibly can.

I notice the details. Hear the sounds. And seep into the moment. I know I won’t do this all the time, but it adds up to create more time truly living in the now.

Checking in with what we're experiencing with and through our senses is an excellent way of bringing the mind back to the present moment. Try it sometime!
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Monday meditative picture blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Right now

I know that the following seems very obvious. Nevertheless, many people feel completely defeated because they're not able to start from someplace other than where they are. Make peace with this one, people, and you will have set the stage for amazing progress:

The journey
you wish to take
can only begin
from where you are
right now
this very minute.

-- Ron Atchison

Sunday art blogging

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Artist: Louis Comfort Tiffany

Image from Wikimedia Commons

A Kindness Revolution

I get emails every day from the folks at the Care 2 site. Several of the communications lately have called my attention to a series of very short articles by Michelle Schoffro Cook who decided to work on creating a "kindness revolution".

You can see of list of the little articles she's offered so far right here.

Here's what inspired her:

“At age 33 Cami Walker, the author of 29 Gifts, was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and the life she knew changed forever. When she was going through some of her most difficult symptoms, she received an uncommon prescription from a friend, an African medicine woman named Mbali Creazzo: Give away 29 gifts in 29 days. Cami was amazed by what unfolded during her month-long journey.”

So Michelle decided to do this too and to invite her readers to participate. Here's something she says about that:

So, here’s the plan: I want to start a Kindness Revolution. I’m tired of all the lying, backstabbing, gossiping, and other parasitic characteristics I’ve seen in many people lately. But, instead of getting even with all those who hurt us, why not join the Kindness Revolution? Why not raise the bar? Reach for the highest common denominator instead of dropping to the lowest? I think kindness is the answer to the world’s ills. And, I’m hoping you’ll agree.
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You don’t even have to spend a penny. You can give prayers, smiles, hugs, kind words, a shoulder to cry on, or donate some of your things to people who might need them. There are so many ways we can give of ourselves to transform the world.

I've never forgotten what I read about the Dalai Lama many years ago. Here's what he said:

"My religion is kindness."

May that be true for each of us as well.
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Valuing the "little" picture

This is a very empowering way of thinking, actually:

If we just worry about the big picture, we are powerless. So my secret is to start right away doing whatever little work I can do. I try to give joy to one person in the morning, and remove the suffering of one person in the afternoon. If you and your friends do not despise the small work, a million people will remove a lot of suffering.

-- Sister Chan Khong (Vietnamese Nun and Peace Activist)

RIP dear Tom

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This sweet boy named Tom went to his reward on Tuesday and we send sincere condolences to long-time Center participant Tommi Cox-Phipps, one of Tom's humans. Tommi was with Tom when he died. Tom was well known for his "silent meow" when he was particularly happy.

Here's another picture:

Do say special prayers or send good thoughts to the Cox-Phipps family in their grief and to the fine Tom kitty himself as he waits at the Rainbow Bridge for his loved ones.

Hey, Tom, do look up my precious Henry as well as Ethel and Edgar. I'm sure they will he happy to show you around the place!

PS: Oh, I almost forgot. The pictures above are by our own Cynthia Burgess! You can see more of Cynthia's outstanding work at Imageplay Photography.
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The most important choice ever

This is the one, folks. Honestly. Please trust me on this one:

We can let the circumstances of our lives harden us so that we become increasingly resentful and afraid, or we can let them soften us, and make us kinder. We always have the choice.

-- The Dalai Lama

Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Looking for and enjoying beauty is another way to nourish the soul. The universe is in the habit of making beauty. There are flowers and songs, snowflakes and smiles, acts of great courage, laughter between friends, a job well done, the smell of fresh-baked bread. Beauty is everywhere, ready to nourish the soul. It must only be seen to begin helping us.

- Matthew Fox

I do love that understanding that "the universe is in the habit of making beauty." It is. As Matthew Fox says, we just need to see it.

Power and potential

Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.

-- Leo Buscaglia

Monday meditative picture blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Everything has its beauty, but not everyone sees it.

- Confucius

The Three Ls

This is good advice for us all.

You can buy the necklace right here.

Friday cat blogging!

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Pause meditation

Here's the choice or decision that will really make a difference:

What is the best use of each day of our lives? In one very short day, each of us could become more sane, more compassionate, more tender, more in touch with the dream-like quality of reality. Or we could bury all these qualities more deeply and get more in touch with solid mind, retreating more into our own cocoon.
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One of the most effective means for working with that moment when we see the gathering storm of our habitual tendencies is the practice of pausing, or creating a gap. We can stop and take three conscious breaths, and the world has a chance to open up to us in that gap. We can allow space into our state of mind.

-- Pema Chödrön

This is an astonishingly effective practice. You stop and you know that you've stopped. Then you take the three conscious - that is, deliberate - breaths. You can do this at any time, and in any place. Try it especially when you're experiencing some sort of distress. Then notice what happens within you.
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Color meditation

Photo from Wikimedia Commons

This is really very interesting indeed. Here's an excerpt from a little article I found on color meditation:

Pay attention to your breathing. Take a deep breath and release it slowly. Take another deep breath, release. Again, deep breath...release.

Now begin to focus on the color red. Let red fill your mind. Picture bright ripe red tomatoes...a male cardinal...a red rose.

Breathe in the color red. Let it fill your body. Feel the strength the red energies are bringing to your body. Exhale. Breathe in red again, filling you with courage. Let your breath out.

Take another deep breath. Let it out. Now, breathe in the color orange. Think of a large, juicy orange...flames dancing in a fire...the sunset.

Fill your mind with orange. As you continue to breathe in the orange energies, feel your confidence build with the power of orange.

There's more. Recommended!

I would imagine that doing this sort of meditation regularly would help us be more mindful and appreciative of colors we notice all around us in the material world.
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Wednesday life form blogging

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Ring-tailed Lemur

Image from Wikimedia Commons

Meditation and pain management

Needless to say, given my hand surgery yesterday, I have pain management on my mind. (Although, don't worry. It's really not all that bad!)

I found a little article written by a woman who tells of a particularly bad night of intense physical pain. She then observes the following:

Then, suddenly, my experience completely changed when I heard a quiet inner voice saying: “You don’t have to get through till morning; you only have to get through the present moment”. It was like a house of cards collapsing, revealing the space that had been present all along, if only I could have recognised it. My experience immediately changed from an agonised, contracted state to one that was soft and rich – despite the physical pain. At that moment of relaxing into the present moment, just as it was, I intuitively knew I had tasted something true.

Learning to stay in the moment reduces suffering more than anything one can imagine. Trust me on this one! It's true and it works.
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A little challenge

No posting today, dear people. I had hand surgery this morning and that makes driving the old computer a wee bit difficult!

I'll be back tomorrow, I sincerely hope.

Blessings to all.
~~~

Memorial Day

Image courtesy VintageHolidayCrafts.com

Happiness

I've shared with you many times that the true purpose of meditation is to decrease suffering and increase happiness. I have just discovered a little quiz that gives you your Be Happy Index that was used by scientists for the BBC documentary "How to Be Happy".

You can find it right here.

I think the questions are simply excellent. It's worth taking the quiz just to find out what the questions are. They would all be great questions for the "reflection process" (that we learn in Session 5 of the Foundations Course here at the Center.)

And here is a corresponding page on 10 Ways to Increase Your Happiness.

Here's a brief passage:

Happiness is your original nature—it is what you first experienced before you began to identify with a body, a family role, some school grades, your nationality, your business card, your Social Security number and any other labels you keep. True happiness is being faithful to your true nature.

As you know, meditation (especially refuge practice) puts us powerfully in touch with our true nature.

Let's all ponder these things, okay?
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For when you need to let go of stress

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A reminder

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People! Have you visited our Cynthia's blog lately? Please visit soon as she's got some new photographs up.

I promise you that if you spend some time over there just browsing (go into archives as well as looking at the front page) you will have a truly meditative experience.

In case some of you don't know this, Cynthia won the "Best in Show" prize in the Tulsa Garden Center photography contest this year.
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Meditation and research

I've shared with you before on this blog about recent research regarding the benefits of meditation. Today I just read a short article that includes the following statment:

In fact, the results of more than 1,000 peer-reviewed articles on meditation suggest that regular practice of meditation is associated with "significant relief from a variety of stress related physical and mental problems, a stronger immune system, longer life, increased energy and positive changes in brain function."

That's a very large number for peer-reviewed material.

If you're not sure what it means for an article to be peer-reviewed, please go here.

The little article is called "Master the Art of Meditation" and it's from a website I just discovered called To Your Health.

Friday cat blogging!

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Motivation

Below is an excerpt from a little article entitled "Motivation to Meditate" :

With a little consideration, it’s easy to see what meditation can do for you. Study after study has proven that it makes you a much healthier individual overall. It improves your immune system, your energy level, and your cardiovascular system. Above even that, it helps you to gain control of the mental war that is going on in your head. Without getting clear and quiet, it is difficult to tap into the inner voice and thoughts that are so important. Listening to this intuition will guide you in the right direction. With this inner guidance system loud and clear, you’ll make fewer mistakes. In contemplation of these many benefits, it should hopefully be easier for you to find motivation to meditate.
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[After a while of meditating consistently], you will start to notice a change in the way you deal with people. You will not jump to conclusions as quickly. Your interpersonal relationships will most likely improve. You will probably be in a much better mood throughout the day. Things that used to get on your nerves will not do so as much any more.

Unskillful habits are hard to break and helpful habits are hard to cultivate. No one disputes this. Making an effort is so worth it, however!

Something about experience

I especially like the last sentence of the following quotation:

Experience is not a matter of having actually swum the Hellespont, or danced with the dervishes, or slept in a doss-house. It is a matter of sensibility and intuition, of seeing, and hearing the significant thing, of paying attention at the right moments, of understanding and coordinating. Experience is not what happens to you; it is what you do with what happens to you.

-- Aldous Huxley

Although Huxley does not use this precise word, he's really talking about mindfulness, isn't he?

Wednesday life form blogging

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Image from Wikimedia Commons

The wrong way to happiness:

[The] innate world view that happiness and suffering come from external sources leads us to believe that if we could only make others and the world be what we wanted them to be, then we would be happy. Thus, we endeavor to rearrange the world and the people in it, gathering towards us those we consider happiness-producing and struggling to be free from those we think cause pain. Although we have tried to do this, no one has succeeded in making the external environment exactly what he or she wants it to be. Even in those occasional situations in which we are able to arrange external people and things to be what we want, they don't remain that way for long. Or, they aren't as good as we thought they would be and we are left feeling disappointed and disillusioned. In effect, the supposed path to happiness through external things and people is doomed from the start because no matter how powerful, wealthy, popular, or respected someone is, he or she is unable to control all external conditions.

-- The Verenable Thubten Chodron

When you think about it, the belief that happiness comes from controlling external conditions is undoubtedly the fundamental cause of all wars.

The excerpt above is from a longer piece by Thubten Chodron you can find right here.

Monday meditative picture blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Inside my empty bottle I was constructing a lighthouse while all the others were making ships.

-- Charles Simic

Something about giving people room

Oh, my. There's really a lot to think about here. Quite a lot:

A hasid complains to his rebbe that wherever he goes, people step on his toes. The rebbe says, "You don't give people room, so they have no where to step but on your toes."

— Nilton Bonder

Friday cat blogging!

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Makes sense to me!

There's some unmistakable clarity here:

Here is a test to find out whether your mission in life is complete. If you're alive, it isn't.

-- Richard Bach

Something about celebration

Has it ever occurred to you that many of us don't celebrate enough? Here's a little reminder:

The clouds above us come together
and disperse; The breeze in the
courtyard departs and returns.
Life is like that, so why not relax?
Who can keep us from celebrating?

- Lu-Yu

Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Oh, wow. What a question!

Just look:

If someone were to pay you $.10 for every kind word you ever spoke and collect $.05 for every unkind word, would you be rich or poor?

-- Anonymous

Monday meditative picture blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Impermanence

I usually get a couple of emails a day from the Care2 folks. Here's an excerpt from a little article by Zen teacher Marc Lesser:

I saw a cartoon in a recent New Yorker magazine in which two people were finishing their dinners at a Chinese restaurant and had just opened their fortune cookies. One fortune read, “You are going to die.”

If you let this fact sink in — that life is short, and we all die — it can actually act as a powerful motivating force to help maintain focus and priorities. Everything changes and is impermanent, so are we fully present and making the most of this fleeting moment? Are we fully aware of what we are doing? Appreciating impermanence clarifies priorities, and it helps us identify any frenetic, shallow and ineffective activities we’re being distracted by. We see clearly the things that exhaust us and distract us from experiencing the blessing and opportunity of each particular day.

We often uncritically think of impermanence as something terrible or, at least, unfortunate. Actually, it is wonderfully consoling. Just think about it for a while.

Friday cat blogging!

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Something about anxiety

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You can read a little bit about Ayya Khema right here. Many of her dharma talks can be found online. She was an excellent, excellent teacher.

Something about the inner life

One of my very favorite writers said this:

I am a writer who came from a sheltered life. A sheltered life can be a daring life as well. For all serious daring starts from within.

- Eudora Welty

Hmm. All seriousness about everything, really, starts from within.
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Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Meditation

I have had great appreciation for this saying for many years now:

Meditation is not a means to an end. It is both the means and the end.

-- Krishnamurti

If that does not make a lot of sense to you right away, never mind. Just ponder it from time to time. Take years at it if you like. And, of course, keep meditating. It will slowly become a vital part of your deeper understanding.
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Monday meditative picture blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Good advice:

Isn't this nice?

It's a print I just bought from Etsy right here.

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Clarity of mission

Who could not wish to live this way?

When you know who you are;
when your mission is clear and you
burn with the inner fire of unbreakable will;
no cold can touch your heart;
no deluge can dampen your purpose.
You know that you are alive.

-- Chief Seattle

Friday cat blogging!

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Something about encouragement

Anyone who has ever had a friend or a boss who was a fault-finder understands how important encouragement is and how disheartening the lack of it can be. Here's another reason to make it part of your way of being in the world:

Note how good you feel after you have encouraged someone else. No other argument is necessary to suggest that one never miss the opportunity to give encouragement.

-- George M. Adams

Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Now

Really, really think about this last sentence:

How simple it is to see that all the worry in the world cannot control the future. How simple it is to see that we can only be happy now. And that there will never be a time when it is not now.

-- Gerald Jampolsky

Sayings to ponder

A friend of mine sent me the following quotations this morning. I think they are all excellent:

There’s a fine line between fishing and just standing on the shore like an idiot.

As a man danced so the drums were beaten for him. (Ibo proverb, from Chinhua Achebe)

If you seek, how is that different from pursuing sound and form? If you don’t seek, how are you different from earth, wood, or stone? You must seek without seeking. (Fo-Yan)

Get away from any man who argues every time he talks. (Abbot Pastor)

Any trial whatever that comes to you can be conquered by silence. (Abbot Pastor)

Clear mind is like the full moon in the sky. Sometimes clouds come and cover it, but the moon is always behind them. Clouds go away, then the moon shines brightly. So don't worry about clear mind: it is always there. When thinking comes, behind it is clear mind. When thinking goes, there is only clear mind. Thinking comes and goes, comes and goes. You must not be attached to the coming or the going. (Zen Master Seung Sahn)

I particularly like the one about staying away from someone who perpetually argues. It's not good for you. And it's also not good for that person.

Monday meditative picture blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

A little Sunday morning levity

Just for fun:

Actually, from a meditative point of view, this gives us a lot of excellent material for reflection! Think about it. (Those of you who are familiar with the Tibetan Book of the Dead will especially recognize what I'm talking about here.)

It's May Day!

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"May Day" by Kate Greenaway

Image from Wikimedia Commons

Let's spend some time outdoors if we can:

Where shall we keep the holiday,
And duly greet the entering May?
Too strait and low our cottage doors,
And all unmeet our carpet floors;
Nor spacious court, nor monarch's hall,
Suffice to hold the festival.
Up and away! where haughty woods
Front the liberated floods:
We will climb the broad-backed hills,
Hear the uproar of their joy;
We will mark the leaps and gleams
Of the new-delivered streams,
And the murmuring rivers of sap
Mount in the pipes of the trees,
Giddy with day, to the topmost spire,
Which for a spike of tender green
Bartered its powdery cap;
And the colors of joy in the bird,
And the love in its carol heard,
Frog and lizard in holiday coats,
And turtle brave in his golden spots;
While cheerful cries of crag and plain
Reply to the thunder of river and main.

-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

That's right: Up and away! And duly greet the entering May.

I hope everyone's day is just lovely.