We arrive and we start again
Hazak, Hazak, Venithazzek [חֲזַק חֲזַק וְנִתְחַזֵּק ]
Be strong,
be strong,
Let us be strengthened
[or Let us strengthen one another]
The words traditionally chanted at the end of the reading of the books of the Torah
Does not just apply to people but to all experiences
When you do not block people from coming to you, when you do not stop people from leaving, and when your mind transcends both their coming and leaving, your spiritual practice is indeed accomplished.
Kim Jae Woong, Polishing the Diamond, Enlightening the Mind: Reflections of a Korean Buddhist Master
If you must look back, do so forgivingly.
If you will look forward, do so prayerfully.
But the wisest course would be to be present
in the present gratefully.
Maya Angelou
Another morning and I wake with thirst for the goodness I do not have.
I walk out to the pond and all the way God has given us such beautiful lessons. Oh Lord, I was never a quick scholar but sulked and hunched over my books past the hour and the bell; grant me, in your mercy, a little more time. Love for the earth and love for you are having such a long conversation in my heart.
Who knows what will finally happen or where I will be sent, yet already I have given a great many things away, expecting to be told to pack nothing, except the prayers which, with this thirst, I am slowly learning.
Mary Oliver, Thirst
When a cat falls out of a tree, it let’s go of itself. The cat becomes completely relaxed, and lands lightly on the ground. But if a cat were about to fall out of a tree, and suddenly make up its mind that it didnt want to fall, it would become tense and rigid, and would be just a bag of broken bones upon landing.
It is the philosophy of the Tao that…the moment we were born we were kicked off a precipice and we are falling, and there is nothing that can stop it.
So instead of living in a state of chronic tension and clinging to all sorts of things that are actually falling with us because the whole world is impermanent, be like a cat.
Alan Watts, What is Tao?
Each second we live is a new and unique moment of the universe
— a moment that never was before and never will be again.
Pablo Casals quoted in Diane Loomans, Full Esteem Ahead
Mindfulbalance 