The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious.
He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder, or stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead. His eyes are closed.
Albert Einstein
Being alive
Month: May 2022
Unanswered Questions
Life is so full of mystery, answers are so few, I do not trust them. I prefer unanswered questions. At the end of the answers there is usually a person who enjoys the power of appearing to know.
I have come to like things that are left unfinished. Its the question that shines the light, that seeks. The answer’s often just a dim reflection of the vastness of the question. There are no answers that satisfy. This is a small life and everything comes to nothing at the end. I like that. I like the idea of smallness and the wonder of basic human things.
from the lovely little book, Marc Hamer, A Life in Nature, or how to catch a mole
Wherever we are
Fundamentally, the practice of love begins with acceptance – the recognition that wherever we are is the appropriate place to practice, that the present moment is the appropriate time.
But for so many of us, our longing to love and be loved has always been about a time to come, a space in the future when it will just happen, when our hungry hearts will finally be fed, when we will find love.
Bell Hooks, Toward a Revolution of Love
Costs nothing today
Seven offerings that cost nothing . . .
A compassionate eye, a smiling face, loving words, a warm heart, physical service, a seat, and lodging.
The Buddha
It doesn’t matter
If we don’t pay attention to every little this, we miss the whole thing. And the contents of this can be anything. This can be straightening our sitting mats, chopping an onion, talking to one we don’t want to talk to. It doesn’t matter what the contents of the moment are; each moment is absolute. That’s all there is, and all there ever will be. If we could totally pay attention, we would never be upset. If we’re upset, it’s axiomatic that we’re not paying attention. If we fill our days and we miss not just one moment, but one moment after another, we’re in trouble.
Charlotte Joko Beck
Sunday Quote: real progress
What progress, you ask, have I made?
I have begun to be a friend to myself.
Hecato of Rhodes, c. 100 BC, Stoic philosopher, quoted in Seneca, Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium VI
Mindfulbalance 