I look;
Morning to night I am never done with looking.
Looking, I mean not just standing around,
but standing around
as though with your arms open.
Mary Oliver, Where does the Temple Begin, Where does it End?
Tag: Joy
Where the heart is…
Here is one simple exercise to help us discover what we love. Looks to see where we give our time and attention. Attention is the physical manifestation of love. If I keep pushing my children away when they want me to play with them, they do not feel loved. I may have love in my heart; I may feel joy when I see them, and want only the best for them. But they will feel my love only when I turn around and give them my undivided attention. Through my attention, they experience my love. Attention is a tangible measure of love. Whatever receives our time and attention becomes the center of gravity, the focus of our life. This is what we do with what we love: We allow it to become our center.
Wayne Muller, How then Shall We live: Four Simple Questions that Reveal the Beauty and Meaning of Our Lives
photo joao pimentel ferreira
How to be at peace
How to be at peace now? By making peace with the present moment. The present moment is the field on which the game of life happens. It cannot happen anywhere else. Once you have made peace with the present moment, see what happens, what you can do or choose to do, or rather what life does through you. There are three words that convey the secret of the art of living, the secret of all success and happiness: One With Life. Being one with life is being one with Now. You then realize that you don’t live your life, but life lives you. Life is the dancer, and you are the dance.
Eckhart Tolle, A new Earth: Awakening to your Life’s Purpose
photo tony hisgett
How to train the mind
Consider all phenomena to be dreams.
Don’t be swayed by outer circumstances.
Be grateful to everyone.
Don’t brood over the faults of others.
Explore the nature of unborn awareness.
At all times simply rely on a joyful mind.
Don’t expect a standing ovation
Atiśa, 980 – 1054, Seven Points for Training the Mind and Heart
photo Ed Yourdon
Sunday Quote: Mystery
The mystery of life is not a problem to be solved;
it is a reality to be experienced
Jacobus Johannes van der Leeuw Dutch author, 1893 – 1934
photo rennett stowe
Fear-driven stories
The quality of our lives depends heavily on whether we assume a world of scarcity or a world of abundance.
By embracing the scarcity assumption, we create the very scarcities we fear. We create scarcity by competing with others for resources as if we were stranded on the Sahara at the last oasis. In the human world, abundance does not happen automatically It is created when we have the sense to choose community, to come together to celebrate and share our common story. Whether the “scarce resource” is money or love or power or words, the true law of life is that we generate more of whatever seems scarce by trusting its supply and passing it around. Authentic abundance does not lie in secured stockpiles of food or cash or influence or affection, but in belonging to a community where we can give those goods to others who need them – and receive them from others when we are in need.
Parker Palmer, The Active Life and Let Your Life Speak
photo john liu
Mindfulbalance 