Keep your eyes fresh and open and joyful.
And move with sure steps, yet flexibly
through the fields of world so richly endowed
Goethe
photo saadbintariq
Author: Karl Duffy
This is a Mindfulness Practice Blog written in Laois, Ireland, containing reflections on meditation practice, psychological growth, spirituality and wellness which hopefully may encourage and benefit others as they reflect on their lives and seek to develop a more balanced, mindful and conscious approach to it.
What distracts us
In a consumer society there are inevitably two kinds of slaves:
the prisoners of addiction and the prisoners of envy.
Ivan Illich, Tools for Conviviality
photo Karin Beate Nøsterud/norden.org
Withdrawing permission
In standing still and receiving life with all its adversity and sorrow, you have withdrawn your permission for suffering to define your life. You have also withdrawn your consent to living in fear. Something profound happens in your heart when you turn with kindness toward all the circumstances of pain which you have previously repressed, dismissed or fled from. There is a softening, an opening, a deepening capacity and willingness to understand sorrow and its cause.
Christine Feldman, Compassion
photo shaun ferguson
Love does that
All day long the little donkey labours, sometimes
with heavy loads on her back and sometimes just with worries
about the things that bother only donkeys.
And worries, as we know, can be more exhausting
than physical labour.
Once in a while a kind monk comes
to her stable and brings a pear, but more
than that,
he looks into the donkey’s eyes and touches her ears
and for a few seconds the donkey is free
and even seems to laugh,
because love does that.
Love frees.
Meister Eckhart
photo dave whalley
….. A new month – another invitation to notice.
Oh do you have time
to linger
for just a little while
out of your busy
and very important day
for the goldfinches
that have gathered
in a field of thistles
for a musical battle,
to see who can sing
the highest note,
or the lowest,
or the most expressive of mirth,
or the most tender?
Their strong, blunt beaks
drink the air
as they strive
melodiously
not for your sake
and not for mine
and not for the sake of winning
but for sheer delight and gratitude –
believe us, they say,
it is a serious thing
just to be alive
on this fresh morning
in the broken world.
I beg of you,
do not walk by
without pausing
to attend to this
rather ridiculous performance.
It could mean something.
It could mean everything.
It could be what Rilke meant, when he wrote:
You must change your life.
Mary Oliver, Invitation
photo stevevoght
A new week….
May you receive great encouragement
when new frontiers beckon.
May you take time to celebrate
the quiet miracles that seek no attention.
May you experience each day
as a sacred gift
woven around the heart of wonder.
John O’Donoghue, Benedictus
photo giorgio minguzzi
