Let us learn to appreciate there will be times when the trees will be bare, and look forward to the time when we may pick the fruit.
Anton Chekhov
Appreciate
Tag: impermanence
Sunday Quote: Start over
You will be shown the way forward when your wagon is overturned
Babylonian Proverb
Slowing Down
The end of the year in the Christian Calendar. A different rhythm begins tomorrow with the start of Advent
In this world of speed and distraction, choosing to be less busy feels almost countercultural; slowing down, eccentric. Perhaps it is, for there’s no denying the expansive, time-bending effects of awareness. Sometimes, I do call it meditation: I sit cross-legged on a cushion in my yoga room; I set a timer and focus on my breath, bringing my attention to bear on the elusive, invisible third eye in the center of my brow point. These sittings are humbling: My mind sneaks away, I chase it down, lead it back, tie it again and again to my breath. Eventually, if I’m not in a rush to get on to the next thing, a small, silent space clears. I savor the taste of quiet, roll it around on my tongue, feel the day’s contours softening and opening around me.
Katrina Kenison, Magical Journey: An Apprenticeship in Contentment
A wider perspective
Meditate within eternity.
Don’t stay inside the mind.
Your thoughts are like a child fretting
near its mother’s breast, restless
and afraid, who with a little guidance,
can find the path of courage
Lalla, 14th century Kashmiri mystic.
Another milestone passed, three quarters of a million hits.
Many thanks for your ongoing support and practice.
Adult questions
A Zen saying helps us – “This being the case, how shall I proceed?”
That is so much more an adult question than “This being the case, who is at fault?” or “why is this happening to me?”
David Richo, The Five Things we Cannot Change
Always in transformation
Most of us believe that we will spend seventy, eighty, ninety or one hundred years on this planet and then we’ll be gone. But when we look deeply, we see this is a wrong perception.
Your lifespan is not limited to seventy, eighty, ninety or one hundred years and that is good news. Your body is not your self; you are much more than this body. You are life without boundaries.
We are not limited to our physical body, even when we are alive. We inter-are with our ancestors, our descendants, and the whole of the cosmos. We do not have a separate self. We are interconnected with all of life, and we, and everything, are always in transformation
Thich Nhat Hahn, How to live when a Loved One Dies
