In our darkest night

No seed ever sees the flower.

Zen saying

 November is the beginning of Winter in the Celtic Calendar and so today signals the beginning of the “darker half” of the year. The balance between light and darkness continues to shift. In the northern hemisphere the earth becomes colder and nature more dormant. Similar processes can occur in our lives. For example, we can choose to go with the rhythm of nature and become more reflective in this period, slowing down and simplifying things. Or our lives can have parts that seem dormant and not going anywhere. Or maybe difficulties are occurring which can seem dark and we see no escape.  However, darkness does not mean that nothing is happening.  I really like this saying from the Zen tradition – things that are now hidden or buried will eventually be seen or bear fruit.  That what is now just germinating will be full of life in time. As humans we like to see immediate results. However, for now, all we can do is wait and trust. Peace comes from knowing the right way to let go. 

Hold what is happening lightly

Just stay at the center of the circle,

and let all things take their course. 

Tao Te Ching

We rush through the day, we miss so much

Another Autumn Saturday, two more poets.

Very foggy all day yesterday, a good metaphor for how we live our lives sometimes. 

Sometimes the mountain
is hidden from me in veils
of cloud, sometimes
I am hidden from the mountain
in veils of inattention, apathy, fatigue,
when I forget or refuse to go
down to the shore or a few yards
up the road, on a clear day,
to reconfirm
that witnessing presence.

Denise Levertov, Witness. 

Instructions for living a life: Pay attention. Be astonished.

Mary Oliver, Sometimes      

One hour at a time

 

Oh, to love what is lovely, and will not last!
What a task
to ask
of anything, or anyone,
yet it is ours,
and not by the century or the year, but by the hours.

Mary Oliver, Snow Geese

Accept yourself

 

The paradox of our practice is that the most effective way of transformation is to leave ourselves alone. The more we let everything be just what it is, the more we relax into an open, attentive awareness of one moment after another

Barry Magid, Leave yourself Alone

Time to take your turn

Giving up some conditioned behaviour patterns is also good:

You didn’t come onto this earth as a perfectionist or control freak. You weren’t born a person of cringe and contraction. You were born as energy, as life, made of the same stuff as stars, blossoms, breezes. You learned contraction to survive, but that was then. You have paid through the nose — paid but good. It is now your turn to reap.

I never used to take my turn. I always gave my turn away. I helped others have a great turn. I must have had a clipboard by the time I was six, because by then I had a whole caseload of people to keep track of. After they had all gotten a turn, then maybe I could go, if there was time and it didn’t bother anyone.

Now I take my turn, as a radical act.

Anne Lamott, Stitches