A long time ago three elders were talking about impermanence. One elder said “Of all those who attend this years party, who knows who will be missing next year”. Another elder said “What you are talking about is far away. When we take off our shoes and socks tonight, we don’t know if we will put them on again tomorrow.”. The third elder said “What you are talking about is still remote. When we exhale this breath, we don’t know if we will breathe in again”
photo markus michalczyk
If you pour a handful of salt into a cup of water, the water becomes undrinkable. But if you pour the salt into a river, people can continue to draw the water to cook, wash, and drink. The river is immense, and it has the capacity to receive, embrace, and transform. When our hearts are small, our understanding and compassion are limited, and we suffer. We can’t accept or tolerate others and their shortcomings, and we demand that they change. But when our hearts expand, these same things don’t make us suffer anymore. We have a lot of understanding and compassion and can embrace others. We accept others as they are, and then they have a chance to transform.
Thich Nhat Hahn
photo Barrow river by sarah777
One of the words in Tibetan for a person can be translated as “one who is on the go” or a “migrating being”. There is a deep truth in this and we do not have to be at an airport to realize that we’re always going somewhere or continually in transit. There is a tendency to be perpetually “on the go”, moving towards or moving away, always in the search of a perfect feeling.
As long as we chase the myth, trying to get happiness by attempting to manipulate and control life – whether through trying harder to succeed, trying to please others, seeking comfort and diversions or even using spiritual practice to become calm – we will continue to trap ourselves on the roller coaster cycle of personal happiness and unhappiness, And sadly we will never taste the true contentment that comes when we learn how to stay present with what is, exactly as it is.
Ezra Bayda, Beyond Happiness
photo Hans Stieglitz
Then there was Jim, who said that for many years he took walks that were ‘ranting’ walks. He would walk and contemplate all the things that angered him about the world. One day he decided to begin taking ‘gratitude’ walks. ‘Now while I walk I recount all the things I am grateful for in my life and don’t allow myself to think of negative things at all. I have found this simple practice to be a great gift.’
John Izzo, The Five Secrets you must Discover before Your Die
Could our minds and our hearts be big enough just to hang out in that space where we’re not entirely certain about who’s right and who’s wrong? Could we have no agenda when we walk into a room with another person, not know what to say, not make that person wrong or right? Could we see, hear, feel other people as they really are? It is powerful to practice this way, because we’ll find ourselves continually rushing around to try to feel secure again — to make ourselves or them either right or wrong. But true communication can happen only in that open space.
Pema Chodron
It is one of the perils of our so-called civilized age that we do not yet acknowledge enough, or cherish enough, the connection between soul and landscape — between our own best possibilities, and the view from our own windows. We need the world as much as it needs us, and we need it in privacy, intimacy, and surety. We need the field from which the lark rises — bird that is more than itself, that is the voice of the universe: vigorous, godly joy. Without the physical world such hope is: hacked off. Is: dried up. Without wilderness no fish could leap and flash, no deer could bound soft as eternal waters over the field; no bird could open its wings and become buoyant, adventurous, valorous beyond even the plan of nature. Nor could we.
Mary Oliver, Home
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