Tag: Be fully present

Still we stumble

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

A Full moon this evening.

A single moon
Bright and clear in an unclouded sky:
Yet still we stumble
In the world’s darkness.
Have a good look:
stop the breath, peel off the skin,
and everybody ends up looking the same.
No matter how long you live,
the result is not altered.
Who will not end up as a skeleton?

Cast off the notion that “I
exist.” …. Entrust yourself to the windblown
clouds, and do not wish to live forever

Ikkyū, 1394 – 1481, Japanese Zen Buddhist monk and poet, in John Stevens, Wild Ways: Zen Poems of Ikkyu

Beyond

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

It is not a matter of looking for happiness

or trying to avoid suffering

but of going to the place beyond happiness or suffering

Ajahn Chah

You didn’t mess up

Karl Duffy4 Comments

I feel gratitude to the Buddha for pointing out that what we struggle against all our lives can be acknowledged as ordinary experience.

Life does continually go up and down. People and situations are unpredictable and so is everything else.

Everybody knows the pain of getting what we don’t want: saints, sinners, winners, losers. I feel gratitude that someone saw the truth and pointed out that we don’t suffer this kind of pain because of our personal inability to get things right.

Pema Chodron

Watch the excuses

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

When you blame, you open up a world of excuses,

because as long as you’re looking outside,

you miss the opportunity to look inside,

and you continue to suffer.


 Donna Quesada, Buddha in the Classroom: Zen Wisdom to Inspire Teachers

Balance

Karl Duffy1 Comment

I suspect that we too often have lost contact with the source of our own existence and have become strangers in our own house. We tend to run around trying to solve the problems of our world while anxiously avoiding confrontation with that reality wherein our problems find their deepest roots: our own selves.

In many ways we are like the busy executive who walks up to a precious flower and says: “What for God’s sake are you doing here? Can’t you get busy somehow?” and then finds the flower’s response incomprehensible: “I am sorry, but I am just here to be beautiful.”

How can we also come to this wisdom of the flower that being is more important than doing?

How can we come to a creative contact with the grounding of our own life?


Henri Nouwen

Tie your camel

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

On getting the right balance between action and acceptance:

Anas ibn Malik reported: A man said, “O Messenger of Allah, should I tie my camel and trust in Allah, or should I leave her untied and trust in Allah?”

The Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said, “Tie your camel and trust in Allah.”

Imam Abu `Isa Muhammad at-Tirmidhi, Sunan al-Tirmidhī, 2517