Healing depends on listening with the inner ear – stopping the incessant blather, and listening. Fear keeps us chattering – fear that wells up from the past, fear of blurting out what we really fear, fear of future repercussions. It is our very fear of the future that distorts the now that could lead to a different future if we dared to be whole in the present.
Marion Woodman, 1928 – 2018, Canadian author and analytical psychologist, The Pregnant Virgin
Once you are able to quiet the mind, you have a highly sustainable source of happiness. My friends, that is a life-changing insight. That suggests that happiness is not something we pursue, happiness is already there. Happiness is something we access, something we allow. Once you understand that, it changes everything in life.
Chade-Meng Tan
Without stepping out the door, one can know the world.
Without looking out of the window
One can see the way of heaven.
The further one goes
The less one knows.
Therefore:
The wise person knows without having to stir,
perceives without having to see,
Accomplishes without having to act.
Lao Tzu Tao Te Ching, chapter 47
Not till your thoughts cease all
their branching here and there,
Not till you abandon all thoughts
of seeking for something,
Not till your mind is motionless
as wood or stone, will you be
on the right road to the Gate.
Huang Po, died 850, influential Chinese Chan master
Give yourself permission not to be not good at something.
Quietly and softly carve out a life on your own terms. Stop apologizing.
Forgive that sometimes things take a while.
Forgive the low-level, near-constant fear.
Celebrate the small successes.
Perhaps joy is its own body of water, wade out into it.
From the blog of Meg Fee, Author of Places I stopped on the Way Home
(Photo from Bray Head, Valentia Island with Skellig Island on the horizon)
Who ever becomes a good rider by talking about horses?
If you wish to embody the Tao,
stop chattering and start practicing.
The Huahujing, attributed to Lao Tzu.
Mindfulbalance 