Tag: Ireland

Changing like the weather

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The weather has turned quite windy with heavy showers here in Ireland and they say that it is finally going to get colder. Indeed the leaves are turning colour and falling, although much later than we are accustomed to in this part of the world. It is a change from the last two years and people would be quite happy if the good weather continued for another few weeks. We have a natural tendency to try and hold on to,  and make permanent, things that are going well. However, as the old text reminds us, it is when we understand impermanence that our minds cease to be contentious and we stop fighting with how things are:

When you feel that you are making emotions and thoughts solid,

contemplate impermanence as a reminder that all is in flux.

Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche

 

Hidden growth

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A lovely misty morning here in Kildare, and the leaves are clearly starting to fall.  Autumn is the “season of mists and mellow fruitfulness” as Keats said in his beautiful description.   The seeds fall underground and move into a period of silent growth. We can learn from them how to trust and wait,  in times which are dark or when nothing seems to be happening.

I gratefully acknowledge how darkness has become less of an enemy for me and more of a place of silent nurturance, where the slow, steady gestation needed for my soul’s growth can occur. Not only is light a welcomed part of my life, but I am also developing a greater understanding of how much I need to befriend my inner darkness.

Joyce Rupp, Little Pieces of Light

photo phil champion

Four years old

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A more practical type of post this afternoon. I started this blog 4 years ago today so this is a kinda of anniversary. And like all birthdays or anniversaries it allows us time to celebrate and take stock. The blog started as a simple aid to those who had done the MBSR Course with me in Geneva to provide an ongoing support. And I hope it has remained true to that purpose: to post some thoughts which help people – now all over the world –  trying to maintain a meditation process or develop a more conscious style of living, by relating directly to this moment. And my main thought is one of gratitude to every one who has read the blog in these past years –  now approaching a quarter of a million – and who have commented, or encouraged, or in many different ways kept it going.

My first post was about change and referred to a wise Advisor, Fr John Hyde,  who I had many years ago in Ireland. And since then I have witnessed some changes, many small and some larger, the most recent of which has been to come back to my home country. I recently put on-line a work-related site www.karlduffy.ie  and would be delighted if you click on that and check it out. It contains some nice scientific stuff on mindfulness and recent mindfulness articles “in the news” which you may find interesting.

I finish by returning to the first quote I ever published. It has been the guiding motif behind the word “balance” which links the blog and my work site. It sets before us our daily task, one which is even more relevant today than it was four year ago.

If you hope to find lasting happiness, you must first answer the question,

what is your true priority – your inner or your outer life?

Philipp Moffitt, Loving Life’s Questions

Learning that fluid is best

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These are the first days of autumn, my favourite season.  This has been a good Summer in Ireland, and the leaves are very slow to reflect a change of atmosphere. However, inevitably, the seasons evolve and have their own rhythm, with periods of growth and periods of rest.  As John O Donohue’s quote yesterday suggests, there is something in our being that is linked to the changes in nature. We can instinctively feel that all things change. That gives birth to the understanding that  there is only suffering to be had when we try to hold onto things, like the long days of summer, or elements of life that have passed. However, I realize how much I like permanence and continualy rehearse a story of a solid, single identity. So I will try and walk in nature and learn that, like the seasons, I too change, things come and go in my life.  Nature lets go and moves on. So should we. We all have need for different tempos in our lives.

Living with meaning

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Yesterday was a long rainy day here in Ireland and a sense of autumn approaching has settled into the days. So I will post for the next few days some reflections on maturing and deepening, and the meaning of fruitfulness in life, as opposed to just indicators of “success”.

The central paradox of our current feel-good culture is that we grow progressively more and more uncertain and less and less persuaded that our lives really mean something. Feeling good is a poor measure of a life, but living meaningfully is a good one, for then we are living a developmental rather than regressive agenda. We never get it all worked out anyway. Life is ragged, and truth is still more raggedy. The ego will do whatever it can to make itself more comfortable; but the soul is about wholeness, and this fact makes the ego even more uncomfortable. Wholeness is not about comfort, or goodness, or consensus — it means drinking this brief, unique, deeply rooted vintage to its dregs.

James Hollis, Finding Meaning in the Second Half of LIfe

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Fitting in

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A new home decoration show starts on the Irish television channel this evening. The popularity of shows like this at the moment – or ones which look at houses abroad or down the country – and which start when people are a bit down after the Summer holidays, can fuel the anxious, comparing mind.  Even how you decorate your home becomes a sign of how well you are doing, or another way to feel that you do not match up:

The need to be normal is the predominant anxiety disorder
in modern life.

Thomas Moore, Original Self