Pain is physical, but suffering is mental.
Outside of the mind there is no suffering.
Pain is essential for the survival of the body, but none compels you to suffer.
Suffering is entirely due to clinging or resisting;
it is a sign of our unwillingness to move on, to flow with life.
Nisargadatta Maharaj, 1897 – 1981, Indian teacher of nondualism
The teachings about recognizing egolessness sound quite abstract, but the path quality of that, the magic instruction that we have all received, the golden key is that part of the meditation technique where you recognize what’s happening with you and you say to yourself, “Thinking.” Then you let go of all the talking and the fabrication and discussion, and you’re left just sitting with the weather – the quality and the energy of the weather itself. Maybe you still have that quaky feeling or that churning feeling or that exploding feeling or that calm feeling or that dull feeling, as if you’d just been buried in the earth. You’re left with that. That’s the key: come to know that.
Pema Chodron, The Wisdom of No Escape
Some days are good, some days are bad.
Today is one of them.
Lawrence Welk, American musician and bandleader, 1903 – 1992
Strong winds are predicted for this weekend, the tail-end of an Atlantic storm…
Time and again I was seeing that if I could handle the winds of the current storm, they would end up blowing in some great gift… Challenging situations create the force needed to bring about change. The problem is that we generally use all the stirred up energy intended to bring about change, to resist change. I was learning to sit quietly in the midst of the howling winds and wait to see what constructing action was being asked of me.
Michael SInger, The Surrender Project
It was in the process of asking that I came upon a truth:
that the unknown is an answer.
That there are answers upon answers,
and sometimes no questions at all.
Mary Oliver, Breakage
A habit is a sure cell of predictability; it can close you off from the unknown, the new, and the unexpected. You were sent to the earth to become a receiver of the unknown. From ancient times, these gifts were prepared for you; now they come towards you across eternal distances. Their destination is the altar of your heart.
John O Donohue, Eternal Echoes
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