Today is made up of unique moments

All religions point to the fact that being fully present is the only state in which you can wake up—not by somehow leaving.

So you have to find your own simple, grounded language to say that to yourself, and that’s a beautiful way to express it: What is this moment, this situation, or this person trying to teach me? Another one that I love is “This is a unique moment. Maybe I’m not so glad about it because it’s painful, but I don’t want to waste it, because it’s never going to happen again this way. So let’s taste it, smell it, experience it”.

Pema Chodron

What kindness really is

I really like this poem and think there is a great truth in it. Real commitment to one another has a depth which is learned in times of difficulty. Love is talked about a lot today but what we seek deep down is a real kindness which is more than just words,  but proves itself in deeds:

Before you know what kindness really is you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.

Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and
    purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you every where
like a shadow or a friend.

Naomi Shihab Nye, The Words Under the Words

Sabbath rest: A meditation to develop peace within ourselves

Sit comfortably for a few moments, letting your body be at rest. Bring your attention into the present and notice whatever sensations are present in your body. In particular, be aware of any sensation, tensions or pains you may have been fighting. Do not try to change them, simply notice them with an interested and kind attention. In each area of struggle you discover, let your body relax and your heart soften. Open to whatever you experience without fighting.  Breathe quietly and let it be.

Continue to sit quietly. Then cast your attention over all the battles that still exist in your life. Sense them inside yourself. If you have an ongoing struggle with your body, be aware of that. If you have been fighting inner wars with your feelings, being in conflict with your own loneliness, fear, confusion, grief,  anger or addiction, sense the struggle you have been waging. Notice the struggles in your thoughts as well. Be aware of how you have carried on the inner battles. Notice the inner armies, the inner dictators, the inner fortifications. Be aware of all that you have fought within yourself, of how long you have perpetuated the conflict.

Gently, with openness, allow each of these experiences to be present. In each area of struggle, let your body,heart and mind be soft. Open to whatever you experience without fighting. Let it be present just as it is. Let go of the battle. Breathe quietly and let yourself be at rest. Invite all parts of yourself to join you at the peace table in your heart

Jack Kornfield, A Path with Heart

Sunday quote: Listen


The first duty of love is to listen

Paul Tillich

The cycles in our lives

Walking in the hills this morning and saw a neglected meadow full of buttercups. It is lovely to see some fields just left “idle”, for wild flowers to then bloom, open for the bees and the butterflies. We do not need to add much to nature, just to let it be and it provides. If left to itself it grows and is fruitful. A bit like our lives. Even when times are tough and seem barren, they grow back and produce fruit even more  abundantly than before – we just have to trust in a cycle which often we cannot see but which is not made up by any one event. It unfolds at its own pace, with its own wisdom. If we have the courage to allow it do so,  it will lead us to what really matters.

……and find joy in them


When you do things from your soul,

you feel a river moving in you, a joy.

Rumi