And did you get what
you wanted from this life, even so?
I did.
And what did you want?
To call myself beloved,
to feel myself
beloved on the earth.
Raymond Carver, written during his last, terminal, illness
What do you want
Month: November 2021
The uncreated
We frequently identify with the mental creations that have come together during our childhood to form our “personality”, but often these are fear-based and limiting.
The Buddha called the deepest dimension of the self, and the deepest dimension of reality, the “unborn” or the “uncreated.” In the Khuddaka Nikaya, the Buddha declared: “There is an unborn, unoriginated, uncreated, unformed…. Since there is an unborn, unoriginated, uncreated, and unformed, therefore there is an escape from the world of the born, originated, created and formed”.
Modern spiritual masters call that depth dimension the “ground of being.” In that ground, there is neither time nor space. Because there’s no time or space, there is no history. Because there is no history, there is only freedom….The Buddha was right. There is an escape from alienation, separation, and fear, and that escape is the awakening to the deepest dimension of our own self.
Andrew Cohen, The Only Place in the Universe
Inner retreat
People seek to get away from it all – to the country, to the sea, to the mountains. You really wish that you could too. Which is a lack of wisdom: you can get away from it anytime you want. By going within. Nowhere you can go is more peaceful – more free of interruptions – than your own inner self.
So constantly give yourself this retreat and renew yourself.
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 4.3
Cycles
Anytime we forget to let go, life will jog us back into remembering. There is nothing that we can cling to in this world. Ultimately, all that we hold dear will require us to let go, in some shape or form. That child will grow up and leave home. That love relationship that’s going so wonderfully? A new cycle will come, in its time. That friendship will change. That job you thought you’d always have? Oops, the company merged. Your position is changed.
Although long-term relationships and secure employment and living in that house feels good, remember, that’s not where your security lies.
Let yourself bond. Let yourself enjoy being friends with the best friend you’ve ever had. Be a loving parent, 100 percent. Throw yourself into that job with all your heart and soul. But your security and joy are not in that other person or job. [It}.. is in you.
Melody Beattie
The little things
But maybe that’s the way it should be.
Maybe working on the little things as dutifully and honestly as we can is how we stay sane when the world is falling apart
Haruki Murakami, Samsa in Love
Sunday Quote: Renewal
As slowly as the ripening fruit
Fertile, detached, and always spent,
Falls but does not exhaust the root.
May Sarton
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