Category: Be fully present

Keeping space in the mind

Karl Duffy1 Comment

File:Blue grapes in vineyard.jpg

Another Monday morning. For some the beginning of a work week can come too soon, the weekend not allowing enough time to relax and wind down. Even from early the mind starts to speed up and get sucked into the details. To balance this, the wisdom and faith traditions place our daily and weekly activities in a wider context, allowing us to see beyond the dramas which play out in our minds,  with us at the center. They remind us that to hold a bigger, slower,  perspective, and to notice little moments of wonder as they present themselves to us, this day.

The sun,

with all those planets revolving around it and dependent on it,

can still ripen a bunch of grapes

as if it had nothing else in the universe to do.

Galileo

Sunday Quote: Still heart

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File:TofukujiReiunin1.jpg

In the still heart that refuses nothing,

the world is twice born.  

Jane Hirshfield

Beautiful (Saturday) morning instructions

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File:Fruit for Breakfast (3994802719).jpg

1.

 Japanese teacher says:
At first light, rise.
Don’t hover between
sleep and waking,
this makes you heavy,
puts a stone inside your heart.

The minute you drift back to shore,
anchor. Breathe.
Remember your deepest name.

2.

Sometimes objects stun me,
bamboo strainer, gray mug,
sitting exactly where
they were left.

They have not slept
or dreamt of lost faces.

I touch them carefully,
saying, tell me what you know.

3.

Cup of waves,
strawberry balanced
in a seashell.

In morning the water seems
clear to the bottom.

No fish blocks my view.

Naomi Shihab Nye, Breaking the Fast

photo thor

We are the awareness

Karl Duffy1 Comment

File:Flickr - Per Ola Wiberg ~ mostly away - stillness of the woods.jpg

The practice of silence nourishes vigilance, self-knowledge, letting go, and the compassionate embrace of all whom we would otherwise be quick to condemn. Gradually we realize that whatever it is in us that sees the mind games we play, is itself free of all such mind games and is utterly silent, pure, vast, and free. When we realize that we are the awareness and not the drama unfolding in our awareness, our lives are freer, simpler, more compassionate. 

Fear remains frightening but we are not afraid of fear. 

Pain still hurts, but we are not hurt by pain.

from Martin Laird’s beautiful book, Into the Silent Land: The Practice of Contemplation

photo Per Ola Wiberg

Who Knows?

Karl Duffy2 Comments

File:Dark Days Are Coming.jpg

We don’t know a lot. We don’t know much more than we know.

And it’s a relief to let go of our attachment to views, our attachment to opinions, especially about things we don’t know.

A new mantra began to form in my mind: “Who knows?”

This not-knowing is not a quality of bewilderment; it’s not a quality of confusion. It actually is like a breath of fresh air, an openness of mind.

Not knowing is simply holding an open mind regarding these very interesting questions to which we might not yet have answers.

Joseph Goldstein

photo Taro Taylor

Monday morning miracles

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fungi

The Lord has spread the delicate net of his presence across the world.
See how He gets under your skin, inside your bones.
If you can’t see Him while you’re alive,
don’t expect a special vision once you’re dead.

Lal Ded (Mother Lalla),  1320 – 1392, Kashmiri Hindu poet and mystic