Month: June 2016

Hold lightly

Karl DuffyLeave a comment
File:U.S. Army Capt. Erik Hickly, foreground, and other members of the Farah Provincial Reconstruction Team participate in a nine-mile rucksack march Sept 120911-N-II659-690.jpg
We have these incredibly heavy burdens we carry with us like rocks in a big rucksack.
We think that carrying this big heavy rucksack is our security; we think it grounds us. We don’t realize the freedom,  the lightness of just dropping it off, letting it go. That doesn’t mean giving up relationships; it doesn’t mean giving up ones profession, or one’s family, or one’s home. It has nothing to do with that; it’s not an external change. It’s an internal change. It’s a change from holding on tightly to holding very lightly
Tenzin Palmo, Into the Heart of Life

Sunday Quote: Never fully there

Karl Duffy1 Comment

File:The dome of May HIll - geograph.org.uk - 1621970.jpg

It always has the capacity to amaze and we are always on the way……

To live is to be born slowly

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

photo Pauline Eccles

Speed

Karl Duffy3 Comments
File:Shenandoah National Park SHEN9228.jpg
It’s a long weekend here in Ireland and the weather is even forecast to be good. A time to slow down, let go our that part of the mind which is task driven and touch into some non-doing:
The great tragedy of speed as an answer to the complexities and responsibilities of existence is that very soon we cannot recognize anything or anyone who is not traveling at the same velocity as we are…..as slaves to speed, we start to lose sight of family members, especially children, or those who are ill or infirm, who are not flying through the world as quickly and determinedly as we are. Just as seriously, we begin to leave behind the parts of our own selves that limp a little, the vulnerabilities that actually give us color and character. We forget that our sanity is dependent on a relationship with longer, more patient cycles extending beyond the urgencies and madness of the office.
David Whyte.

Falling and getting back up

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

File:Toddler running and falling.jpg

If there be anywhere on earth a lover of God who is always kept safe,

I know nothing of it, for it was not shown to me.

But this was shown:

that in falling and rising again we are always kept in the same love

Julian Of Norwich 1342 – 1416, Anchoress at the church of St Julian, Norwich

photo Jamie Campbell

Loving kindness

Karl Duffy2 Comments

File:Baby Elephant.jpg

I love the gentle kindness in these words, and they are so true of real love. 

Sadly, they are far away from how we often treat ourselves. 

We are not wholly bad or good

We who live our lives under Milk Wood

And Thou, I know will be the first

To see our best side, and not our worst. 

Minister Eli Jenkin’s prayer in Dylan Thomas’ Under Milk Wood,  sometimes known as the Sunset poem

photo wiliam warby

Flow: A motto to guide this month

Karl Duffy7 Comments

lake nyonThe Master gives himself up

to whatever the moment brings.

He knows that he is going to die,

and he has nothing left to hold on to;

No illusions in his mind,

no resistances in his body.

He doesn’t think about his actions;

they flow from the core of his being.

He holds nothing back from life;

therefore he is ready for death,

as a man is ready for sleep

after a good day’s work.

Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching