Tag: impermanence

Not limiting ourselves

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Our identity, which seems so reliable, so substantial,  is in fact very fluid, very  dynamic. There are unlimited possibilities to what we might think, what we might feel, and how we might experience reality. We have what it takes to free ourselves from the suffering of a fixed reality and connect with the fundamental ….mystery of our being, which has no fixed identity. Your sense of yourself – who you think you are at a relative level – is a very restricted version of who you truly are. 

Pema Chodron, Living Beautifully with Uncertainty and Change

Who we really are

Karl Duffy2 Comments

When we taste something, what is the ‘realness’ of it? We can say, ‘It tastes nice’ but this is what we think about it, not what the taste is. We can say, ‘It’s a grape’, but that’s a designation, a perception, isn’t it? What is the actual taste? We say, ‘It’s sweet’, but ‘sweet’ is a judgment, isn’t it? We come to understand that the reality of it is indefinable, and that for most of our life we are operating at the level of interpretations and classifications, of secondary experiences, rather than living the actuality of it. We never even know who we really are, because everything is constantly changing; the reference points are changing so although we feel we’re something, nothing quite fits. So as long as we identify with the world of change and appearance, this is all we shall ever feel ourselves to be, just an appearance that changes and wants to find a certain position.

Ajahn  Sucitto, Gnosis and non-dualism

A new skin

Karl Duffy1 Comment

We seldom become all of who we are until forced to it….. I have come to believe that we are destined to be opened by the living of our days, and whether we like it or not, whether we choose to participate or not, we will in time, everyone of us, wear the deeper part of who we are as new skin. Either by erosion from without or by shedding from within – and often both – we are forced to live more authentically. And once the crisis that opened us passes, the real choice then becomes: Will we continue such authentic living?

Mark Nepo, The Book of Awakening

No permanence

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We cling to our own point of view, as if everything depended on it.

Yet our views have no permanence;

like autumn and winter, they gradually pass away.

Chuang Tzu,  4th century BC

A letting go practice

Karl Duffy2 Comments

November is the month of letting go of what is no longer needed or has fulfilled its purpose, just as trees now release the last season’s leaves. In China, an old proverb speaks to this: “Give away, throw away or move 27 items for nine days and your life will change.” The practice of letting go teaches us about non-attachment. The process of releasing or emptying provides room for new possibilities, opportunities, and blessings to enter our lives. In November we can readily see how much we have to be thankful for compared to our troubles and dissatisfactions. As we extend gratitude for the bounty and goodness that are present in our lives, any pockets of ingratitude that once seemed large in our imaginations become dwarfed- nearly nonexistent. 

Angeles Arrien 1940 – 2014, Cultural anthropologist.

The driving force

Karl Duffy5 Comments

 

Today, November 2nd, is traditionally the day that we remember those close to us who have died and gone before us

All men should strive to learn before they die,

what they are running from,

and to, and why.

James Thurber