See how the flesh grows back
across a wound, with a great vehemence,
more strong
than the simple, untested surface before.
Jane Hirshfield, For What Binds Us
photo Kanchelskis
Tag: heart
The gift of life
A reminder to see each day as a gift to be celebrated:
God has given us the gift of life
It is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living fully
(Dieu nous a donné le vivre; c’est à nous de nous donner le bien vivre)
Voltaire, 1694–1778, French writer, philosopher and public activist, Œuvres complètes de Voltaire: melanges. commentaires sur corneille.
Sunday Quote: Little needs, much contentment.
If we have little needs and much contentment,
we experience the wealth of the world around us,
and when we experience that wealth
there’s nothing we need to renounce
and nothing we need to add to it.
Elizabeth Mattis-Namgyel
What to remember in a time of change
A similar theme, this time from the Christian tradition:
Nothing lasts. No single thing can consume our entire life’s meaning. No single thing can give us total satisfaction. Nothing is worth everything: neither past, nor present nor future. It isn’t true that the loss of any single thing will destroy us. Everything in life has some value and life is full of valuable things, things worth living for, things worth doing, things worth becoming, things worth loving again. It is only a matter of being detached enough from one thing to be open to everything else.
The essence of life is not to find the one thing that satisfies us but to realize that nothing can ever completely satisfy us.
Joan Chittister, After Great Pain: Finding a Way Out
This is how it is 2: Whatever arises must pass away
Sometimes I’d go to see old religious sites with ancient temple buildings, designed by architects, beautifully built by skilled craftsmen. In some places they would be cracked. Maybe one of my friends would remark, “Such a shame, isn’t it? It’s cracked. ” I’d say: “If that weren’t the case then there’d be no such thing as the Buddha, there’d be no Dharma. It’s cracked like this because it’s perfectly in line with the Buddha’s teaching.
Ajahn Chah
photo sookie
Hold this day lightly
Most of us are very good at bringing suffering upon ourselves, by taking something that is happening and fixating on it, creating a worry and letting it take root inside us. We are less good at simply letting things be, without wanting to fix the world according to our preferences:
Sitting quietly,
doing nothing,
Spring comes,
and the grass grows,
by itself.
Matsuo Bashō, 1644 – 1694
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