Tag: balance

Time simply for ourselves

Karl Duffy1 Comment

File:ContemplatingCastleBedford.JPG

One reason we do sitting meditation is to strengthen our capacity to be with ourselves. It is a profound act of gentleness, because we allow ourselves to simply be, without any need to achieve or do.  The weekend allows us a little more time to cultivate this space in our lives, through winding down, walking in nature, creating some area for “Non-doing”. This is a key to happiness, growth and to real relationships with others.

No other person will completely feel like we do, think like we do, act like we do. Each of us is unique, and our aloneness is the other side of our uniqueness. The question is whether we let our aloneness become loneliness or whether we allow it to lead us into solitude. Loneliness is painful; solitude is peaceful. Loneliness makes us cling to others in desperation; solitude allows us to respect others in their uniqueness and create community.

Henri Nouwen.

photo simon speed

The Basics of Practice 5: The natural breath

Karl Duffy1 Comment

File:Heavy mist over lake Kaviskis (Lithuania).jpg

As you start the practice, you have a sense of your body and a sense of where you are, and then you begin to notice the breathing. The whole feeling of the breath is very important. The breath should not be forced, obviously; you are breathing naturally. The breath is going in and out, in and out. With each breath you become relaxed.

Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche

Open to the life we have

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Today dawned very foggy over Ireland and England, narrowing down things and dulling the senses somewhat. Sometimes,  in similar ways,  we narrow down our possibilities by not being open to all  that is actually going on in our lives, as we think better is to be found elsewhere, or in the future:

We often disapprove of parts of our lives without really examining them – it’s like never going into certain rooms of your house. But meditation allows all the voices and all the images into the room. When we open the invisible doors, we can come to rest in the life we have; we can love it as it is instead of waiting for a shinier version. “Every day is a good day”, goes the Zen koan.

John Tarrant, Enlightenment is Something we do Together

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Losing contact with basic goodness

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Flowers book

The losing of paradise is enacted over and over again by the children of Adam and Eve. We clothe our souls with messages and doctrines, and lose contact with the great life in the naked breast of nature

Rabindranath Tagore

Does the rose have to do something? No, the purpose of a rose is to be a rose. Your purpose is to be yourself. You don’t have to run anywhere to become someone else. You are wonderful just the way you are. This teaching …. allows us to enjoy ourselves, the blue sky, and everything that is refreshing and healing in the present moment. We already have everything we are looking for, everything we want to become. I am happy in the present moment. I do not ask for anything else. I do not expect any additional happiness. Aimlessness is stopping and realizing the happiness that is already available.

Thich Nhat Hahn

The Basics of Practice 3: Training the mind

Karl Duffy1 Comment

File:Treadmills at gym.jpg

Each meditation session is a journey of discovery to understand the basic truth of who we are. In the beginning the most important lesson of meditation is seeing the speed of the mind. But the meditation tradition says that mind doesn’t have to be this way: it just hasn’t been worked with. What we are talking about is very practical. Mindfulness practice is simple and completely feasible. And because we are working with the mind that experiences life directly, just by sitting and doing nothing, we are doing a tremendous amount.

Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche

Learning from nature

Karl Duffy1 Comment

springbuds

Meditation is really just learning to enjoy your experience, so you don’t have to tense up. Don’t make meditation a project like everything else. The word “natural” is very important. Yesterday I was walking around and it was so beautiful here….We appreciate nature because it’s so uncontrived and unselfconscious. Bring that to mind and know that the body itself has its own intelligence.

Elizabeth Matthis-Namgyel, in Pema Chodron on 4 Keys to Waking Up