It isn’t the things that happen to us that cause us to suffer;
it’s how we relate to the things that happen to us that causes us to suffer.
photo of a robin sheltering from the wind and the rain by phil sangwell
Tag: Awareness
Familiar stories
We can have a lot of stories about how our lives are heading, or what our strengths and weaknesses are, or why things are not going as the should go…
One of the most beautifully disturbing questions we can ask, is whether a given story we tell about our lives is actually true, and whether the opinions we go over every day have any foundation or are things we repeat to ourselves simply so that we will continue to play the game. It can be quite disorientating to find that a story we have relied on is not only not true – it never was true…In fact, the continued retelling of it simply imprisons us. We are used to the prison, however, we have indeed fitted cushions and armchairs and made it comfortable and have locked the door from the inside.
David Whyte, Letter from the House, Winter 2012
What gives us energy
The health of the eye seems to demand a horizon.
We are never tired,
so long as we can see far enough.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
photo from the top of Skellig Michael by mike shields
Just the way it is
Something we need to hold in mind at all times...
If you are invested in security and certainty
you are on the wrong planet
Pema Chodron
Where your life is
What I want to say is
that the past is the past,
and the present is what your life is,
and you are capable
of choosing what that will be,
darling citizen.
So come to the pond,
or the river of your imagination,
or the harbor of your longing,
and put your lips to the world.
And live
your life.
Mary Oliver, from Mornings at Blackwater
photo of the River Barrow at Bagenalstown, Co Carlow, May 18th 2015.
Hidden depths
In almost every tradition there are tales of gods appearing in the guise of ordinary visitors. In the Hebrew Scriptures, Abraham looked up and saw three men standing near. He welcomed them, not knowing they were angels. Here Mary Oliver tells of a similar story from Ancient Greece. The key is paying attention, which allows us see the riches in everyday occurrences. In this way some people show “hospitality to angels without knowing it”
In Greece,
a long time ago,
an old couple
opened their door
to two strangers
who were,
it soon appeared,
not men at all,
but gods.
It is my favorite story –
how the old couple
had almost nothing to give
but their willingness
to be attentive –
but for this alone
the gods loved them
and blessed them –
when they rose
out of their mortal bodies,
like a million particles of water
from a fountain,
the light
swept into all the corners
of the cottage,
and the old couple,
shaken with understanding,
bowed down –
but still they asked for nothing
but the difficult life
which they had already.
And the gods smiled, as they vanished,
clapping their great wings.
from Mary Oliver, Mockingbirds
