Tag: impermanence

Falling apart and renewal

Karl Duffy1 Comment

Written during the COVID pandemic but can apply to all setbacks and seasons in our lives.

There is a giveaway in all of the apocalyptic sections of the three Synoptic Gospels. In Matthew 24:8, hidden there in the middle of the wars and earthquakes it says, “All this is only the beginning of the birth pangs.” Apocalypse is for the sake of birth not death. Yet most of us have heard this reading as a threat. Apparently, it’s not. Anything that upsets our normalcy is a threat to the ego but in the Big Picture, it really isn’t.

In Luke 21, Jesus says right in the middle of the catastrophic description: “Your endurance will win you your souls.” Falling apart is for the sake of renewal, not punishment. Again, such a telling line. In Mark 13, Jesus says “Stay awake” four times in the last paragraph (Mark 13:32–37). In other words, “Learn the lesson that this has to teach you.” It points to everything that we take for granted and says, “Don’t take anything for granted.”

We would have done history a great favor if we would have understood apocalyptic literature. It’s not meant to strike fear in us as much as a radical rearrangement.

It’s not the end of the world. It’s the end of worlds – our worlds that we have created.

Richard Rohr, This is an Apocalypse

There is a time for all things

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

There is special providence in the fall of a sparrow.

If it be now, ‘tis not to come;

if it be not to come, it will be now;

if it be not now, yet it will come.

The readiness is all.

Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act V, ii

Monday morning, start again

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

One part of meditation practice is not holding on too strongly to the past or leaning too far into the future. This allows us to savour the present fully.

And if happiness should surprise you again, do not mention its previous betrayal.

Enter into the happiness, and burst.

Mahmoud Darwish, 1941 – 2008, Palestinian poet and author, Journal of an Ordinary Grief

Round and round

Karl Duffy2 Comments

There is a whole drama department in our head, and the casting director indiscriminately handing out the roles of inner dictators and judges, adventurers and prodigal sons, inner entitlement and inner impoverishment. ….When we see how compulsively these thoughts repeat themselves, we being to understand the psychological truth of samsara, the Sanskrit word for circular, repetitive existence…..Samsara also describes the unhealthy repetitions in our daily life. On a moment-to-moment level, we can see our samsaric thought patters re-arise, in unconscious and limited ways. For example, we see how frequently our thoughts include fear, judgment, or grasping. Our thoughts try to justify our point of view. As an Indian saying points out: “He who cannot dance claims the floor is uneven.”

Jack Kornfield, The Wise Heart: A Guide to the Universal Teachings of Buddhist Psychology

of ordinary things

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

It is a kind of love, is it not?
How the cup holds the tea,
How the chair stands sturdy and foursquare,
How the floor receives the bottoms of shoes
Or toes. How soles of feet know
Where they’re supposed to be.
I’ve been thinking about the patience
Of ordinary things, how clothes
Wait respectfully in closets
And soap dries quietly in the dish,
And towels drink the wet
From the skin of the back.
And the lovely repetition of stairs.
And what is more generous than a window?

Pat Schneider, 1934 – 2020, American writer, poet, writing teacher and editor

Things stick

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

“The Great way is not difficult. It just avoids picking and choosing.” There is a Taoist flavor to this saying. The sense of following the water path through life. The water if it runs into a stone, it just makes its way around. The water is clear and has no attachments which is why we have a little bowl of water on the altar.…. If we are clear, we hang onto the clarity. This old student doesn’t even hang onto that. Do you still hang onto anything, or not? So we could say that the greatest method of meditation is that whatever comes up, just don’t cling to it. Whatever comes up, let it go. If you can do this, you’ll find the way home very quickly. But it’s hard. Things stick to you.


John Tarrant