Leucon, no one’s allowed to know his fate,
Not you, not me: don’t ask, don’t hunt for answers
In tea leaves or palms. Be patient with whatever comes.
This could be our last winter, it could be many
More, pounding the Tuscan Sea on these rocks:
Do what you must, be wise, cut your vines
And forget about hope. Time goes running, even
As we talk.
Take the present, the future’s no one’s affair.
Horace, 65 – 8 BC, Ode 1, 11
We all share a common story, with moments of weakness, wrong turns or unwanted places in our lives. However, if we see them wisely, they can become a fertile seedbed, bringing forth growth into the fullness of our lives.
Pay close attention to your mean thoughts.
That sourness may be a blessing,
as an overcast day brings rain for the roses
and relief to dry soil.
Don’t look so sourly on your sourness!
It may be it’s carrying what you most deeply need
and want. What seems to be keeping you from joy
may be what leads you to joy.
Don’t call it a dead branch.
Call it the live, moist root.
Don’t always be waiting to see
what’s behind it. That wait and see
poisons your Spirit.
Reach for it.
Hold your meanness to your chest
as a healing root,
and be through with waiting.
Rumi
The mind is exactly this tree, that grass….
without thought or feeling both disappear
Ikkyu, 1394 – 1481 , Zen Buddhist monk and poet.
Life is serious all the time, but living cannot be.
You may have all the solemnity you wish in your neckties, but in anything important (such as sex, death, and religion), you must have mirth or you will have madness.
G.K. Chesterton
One kind word can warm three winter months
Japanese proverb
To play a wrong note is insignificant;
to play without passion is inexcusable.
Beethoven
Mindfulbalance 