The mind that tries to shape tomorrow beyond its capacities
will find no rest.
Be kind to yourself, dear – to your innocent follies.
Forget any sounds or any touch you knew that did not help you to dance.
You will come to see that all evolves us.
Rumi, found in Daniel Ladinsky, Love Poems From God
AS humans we instinctively turn away from what we find difficult, or are impatient for difficult moments to pass:
In a dream, I was working hard to finish a bridge to cross some river whose current was strong. Just as I finished the arc of the bridge, an elephant appeared in the water. It was stepping down the middle of the stream. When it was squarely beneath my unfinished bridge, it stopped to douse itself with water…All at once, the sheen of water on its back made me question why I was building a bridge in the first place. It made me question if what I was crossing really needed to be entered. It made me wonder: If I were to enter the stream rather than cross it, would I have a different sense of where I was going?
In the days since the dream, the image of the elephant under the unfinished bridge has made me consider obstacles differently. Now when I stumble before things I don’t understand, I try to remember the elephant dousing itself in the middle of what I thought I had to cross and ask myself: Is the thing in the way something I need to cross or enter? If it’s a difficulty involving love or fear, where will I be led by crossing it? Where will I be led by entering it? At each turn, I find myself needing to know: What must I face and what must I bridge?
Mark Nepo
Recall the way you are all possibilities
you can see and how you live best
as an appreciator of horizons
whether you reach them or not.
David Whyte, Mameen
A way of working with difficult moments, difficult emotions and with these difficult times:
When you’re like a keg of dynamite just about to go off, patience means just slowing down at that point – just pausing- instead of immediately acting on your usual, habitual response. You refrain from acting, you stop talking to yourself, and then you connect with the soft spot. But at the same time you are completely and totally honest with yourself about what you are feeling. You’re not suppressing anything; patience has nothing to do with suppression. In fact, it has everything to do with a gentle, honest relationship with yourself. That frustration, that uneasiness and vulnerability is nothing solid. And yet it is painful to experience. Just wait and be patient with your anguish and with the discomfort of it. This means relaxing with that restless energy – knowing it’s the only way to find peace for ourselves.
Pema Chodron, Practicing Peace in Times of War
One of the challenges of ongoing lockdowns is that we postpone life until this is all over, and because of this, the possibilities that are there in every day can pass us by.
Be present. Make love. Make tea. Avoid small talk. Embrace conversation. Buy a plant, water it. Make your bed. Make someone else’s bed. Have a smart mouth, and quick wit. Run. Make art. Create. Swim in the ocean. Swim in the rain. Take chances. Ask questions. Make mistakes. Learn. Know your worth. Love fiercely. Forgive quickly. Let go of what doesn’t make you happy. Grow.
Paulo Coelho
Since many places of worship have been closed these times, and we are removed from many of our usual supports, we have developed sanctuaries and refuges inside ourselves
Once upon a time some disciples begged their old and ailing master not to die. “But if I do not go, how will you ever see?” the Master said to them. “What is it we can possibly see when you are gone?” one of them asked. With a twinkle in his eye, the Master answered, “All I ever did in my entire life was to sit on the river bank handing out river water. After I’m gone, I trust that you will notice the river.”
Found in Joan Chittister, in Thomas Merton: Seeder of Radical Action and the Enlightened Heart
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