Always off balance

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 Heavy rain this morning in Ireland, after a bright autumn day yesterday. An easy lesson in the inevitability of change and that our real work lies in becoming familiar with movement, not in standing still.  Moreover, this constant change allows us develop insight into another learning, namely that we should never expect to really arrive at a competed work and that, as Theologian Karl Rahner said, in this life “all symphonies remain unfinished”. Sitting with this allows us  relax in the knowledge that things are never quite perfect, yet still can be complete for that moment:

We realize this life as something always off its balance, something in transition, something that shoots out of a darkness through a dawn into a brightness that we feel to be the dawn fulfilled. In the very midst of the continuity our experience comes as an alteration. ‘Yes,’ we say at the full brightness, ‘this is what I just meant.’ ‘No,’ we feel at the dawning, ‘this is not yet the full meaning, there is more to come.’ In every crescendo of sensation, in every effort to recall, in every progress towards the satisfaction of desire, this succession of an emptiness and fullness that have reference to each other and are one flesh is the essence of the phenomenon

William James, A Pluralistic Universe

Not getting too fixed today

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The real art of conducting consists in transitions

Gustav Mahler.

What is this

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At a retreat once in the UK with Martine Bachelor, I heard her talk of a practice which was taught in the monastery where she was as a nun. It seemed simple  – to keep repeating the words “What is this” when involved in the different activities of the day. It was an exercise designed to allow the person create a gap or a pause, and notice what was before them, therefore encouraging them to enter more deeply into whatever was happening in that moment. It is a good practice for getting in touch with the felt sense in our body. It slows down the tendency to spin off into our stories and our fears. It develops our ability to fully experience the moment we are having, and this may strengthen our capacity for joy.

All religions point to the fact that being fully present is the only state in which you can wake up—not by somehow leaving.

So you have to find your own simple, grounded language to say that to yourself,

What is this moment, this situation, or this person trying to teach me?

Another one that I love is “This is a unique moment. Maybe I’m not so glad about it because it’s painful, but I don’t want to waste it, because it’s never going to happen again this way.

So let’s taste it, smell it, experience it”.

Pema Chodron

What to be aware of today

Walking the Dog

If one thing is developed and cultivated, the body is calmed, the mind is calmed, discursive thoughts are quieted,

and all wholesome states that partake of supreme knowledge reach fullness of development.

What is that one thing?

It is mindfulness directed to the body

The Anguttara Nikaya

 

Working with our patterns

Mindfulness and some anxiety problems

Sometimes it is hard to let go and let the future evolve, or let set-backs simply pass through, as the brain’s default pattern tends to be negative and we are always scanning for danger. Our habit of comparing ourselves with others evolved as a necessary survival skill, essential to see who was stronger – and a threat – or to identify potential allies. This survival necessity became deeply embedded in our consciousness as an alertness, a certain vigilance. However, for some people,  –  depending on the level of constancy they experienced in the first years of life with their parents – this low-level hum of vigilance can be replaced by a continual anxious scanning for danger and  everyday experiences  can start the neurons in the brain gossiping and worrying.

It is not easy to work with the mind when it is triggered into deep anxieties. However, Pema Chodron’s quote this morning encourages us to identify this frequently active comparing mind and to try cultivating a “don’t know” mind.  The more we can see these mental energies for what they are – perceptions and judgments of the mind – the less they have the capacity to pull us out of the moment. Outside of our mind, the relative concept of “better” has no sense.

For many of us, feelings of deficiency are right around the corner. It doesn’t take much — just hearing of someone else’s accomplishments, being criticized, getting into an argument, making a mistake at work — to make us feel that we are not okay. As a friend of mine put it, “Feeling that something is wrong with me is the invisible and toxic gas I am always breathing.” When we experience our lives through this lens of personal insufficiency, we are imprisoned in what I call the trance of unworthiness. Trapped in this trance, we are unable to perceive the truth of who we really are.

Tara Brach, Radical Acceptance

We just don’t know

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Letting there be room for not knowing is the most important thing of all. When there’s a big disappointment, we don’t know if that’s the end of the story. It may just be the beginning of a great adventure. Life is like that. We don’t know anything. We call something bad; we call it good. But really we just don’t know

Pema Chödrön, When things Fall Apart