Teach us to discover the worth of each thing, to be filled with awe and contemplation,
to recognize that we are profoundly united with every creature as we journey towards your infinite light.
Pope Francis, Laudato Si
Sunday Quote: Filled with awe
Tag: Joy
The Serenity that is Always Here
There is a full moon this evening – the Harvest Moon.
The moon here represents our original mind: luminous, complete and unstained, not disturbed by fear or by having to explain itself. The lake is our ordinary everyday experience, which can get agitated by worries and anticipations. When stirred, the moon seems fragmented. When we are still and at ease, the water becomes clear and the moon is revealed, an indescribable and serene completeness.
吾心似秋月，
碧潭清皎潔。
My heart-mind is like the autumn moon,
in a clear and bright jade-green lake.
Nothing can compare with it
– how can I explain it in words?
Hanshanzi, Chinese Buddhist monk, poet, and spiritual writer
Do Not Miss the Day
‘What are days for?
Days are where we live.
They come, they wake us
Time and time over.
They are to be happy in:
Where can we live but days?’
Philip Larkin, Days
The cost of vigilance
Some lives have very strong internal observers: the parent, critic, authority figure or imagined public.
I lived so carefully,
thinking someone was watching.
But the stage was empty;
the audience never came.
Attributed to Osamu Dazai, modern Japanese author of No Longer Human
The glory of God is a human being fully alive
Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book IV, 20.7
Contentment
Much of our dissatisfaction comes from mentally living in the future or the past rather than inhabiting the present. Here, two Jungian therapists suggest that contentment comes from bringing one’s full presence to the task or the experience immediately before one.
St. Benedict, an Italian monk of the early sixth century and founder of the Benedictine order, had a powerful approach to staying in the present.
The word novice comes from medieval Latin, and it means to be a beginner, a person who is new to an activity.
St. Benedict instructed novices to take a special vow – a vow of fidelity to the moment.
Robert A. Johnson and Jerry M. Ruhl, Contentment: A Way to True Happiness.
Sunday Quote: What Is Already Here?
Our minds are always asking “How can this moment be better?”
What if we tried asking today, “What is already here?” and stop wishing that reality become something else:
A monk asked Yaoshan
What is the essenital truth in all your teaching?
Yaushan replied
Clouds are in the blue sky;
water is in the bottle
Chan master Yaoshan Weiyan , 751–834, found in the Transmission of the Lamp
