…to see things differently

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In a sense, our path is no path. The object is not to get somewhere. There is no great mystery, really; what we need to do is straightforward. I don’t mean that it is easy; the “path” of practice is not a smooth road. It is littered with sharp rocks that can make us stumble or that can cut right through our shoes. Life itself is hazardous. The path of life seems to be mostly difficulties, things that give trouble. Yet the longer we practice, the more we begin to understand that those sharp rocks on the road are in fact like precious jewels; they help us to prepare the proper condition for our lives…There are sharp rocks everywhere. What changes from years of practice is coming to know something you didn’t know before: that there are no sharp rocks — the road is covered with diamonds.

 Charlotte Joko Beck, Nothing Special

photo of Slieve Donard, County Down,  Ireland by Dean Molyneaux

Sunday Quote: Wisdom…

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Everything that has a beginning has an ending.

Make your peace with that and all will be well

Jack Kornfield, The Buddha’s Little Instruction Book

The art of living

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The art of living…is neither careless drifting on the one hand nor fearful clinging to the past….on the other. It consists in being sensitive to each moment, in regarding it as being utterly new and unique, in having the mind open and fully receptive

Alan Watts, The Wisdom of Insecurity

In the present

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Our way is to practice one step at a time,

one breath at a time,

with no gaining idea.

Shunryu Suzuki

Acceptance

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Happiness happens when you fit with your life, when you fit so harmoniously that whatsoever you are doing is your joy. Then suddenly you will come to know: meditation follows you. If you love the work that you are doing, if you love the way you are living, then you are meditative.

Osho

Grounded

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To be rooted

is perhaps the most important and least recognized need

of the human soul.

Simone Weil, French Philosopher, 1909 – 1943