People have a hard time letting go of their suffering.
Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.
Thich Nhat Hanh
photo D. Sharon Pruitt
Tag: growth
Finding a better space
Fear is the cheapest room in the house.
I would like to see you living in better conditions.
Hafiz
photo muffinn
Bit by bit
Meaning does not come to us in finished form, ready-made; it must be found, created, received, constructed. We grow our way toward it. And sometimes the precious bit of true self, the unlived bit of soul, hides in psychological complexes, in illness, even in tragedy, even in sin…Some mysterious power uses what we see as horrific as as the defeat of all our hopes to bring about our salvation.
Ann Bedford Ulanov, The Wizards Gate
photo jose antonio bielsa arbiol
Always changing
It is the stubbornness with which we refuse to let what’s growing underneath come through that pains us. It is the fear that nothing is growing underneath that feeds our despair. It is the moment that we cease growing in any direction that is truly deadly.…Imagine if trees never shed their leaves, or if waves never turned over, or if clouds dumped their rain and disappeared. I say this to remind myself as much as you: Little deaths prevent big deaths. What matters most is waiting its turn, underneath all that is expending itself to prepare the way.
Mark Nepo, The Book of Awakening
Summer thoughts
Beautiful warm and Summer weather here in Ireland, the UK and in Europe at the moment. I know that I have posted this before, but a walk along country roads and in the woods brought it to mind:
I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
Mary Oliver, The Summer Day
photo of Mullaghreelan Woods Co. Kildare
A finite world
If to enjoy even an enjoyable present we must have the assurance of a happy future, we are “crying for the moon.” We have no such assurance. The best predictions are still matters of probability rather than certainty, and to the best of our knowledge every one of us is going to suffer and die. If, then, we cannot live happily without an assured future, we are certainly not adapted to living in a finite world where, despite the best plans, accidents will happen, and where death comes at the end.
Alan Watts, The Wisdom of Insecurity
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