So few grains of happiness
measured against all the dark
and still the scales balance.
The world asks of us
only the strength we have and we give it.
Then it asks more, and we give it.
Jane Hirshfield, The Weighing
Sunday Quote: Resilience
Tag: Joy
Whatever side of the balance
It’s human to have expectations, but clinging to them causes suffering.
If we can loosen our grip on expectations and settle down on whichever side of the balance we fall at this moment, we find unshakable peace of mind, and a truly stable life unfolds. [Meditation] is ceasing to be a person always gauging gain and loss and evaluating life according to such calculations.
Kosho Uchiyama Roshi, Zen Teaching of homeless Kodo
Let go of unworthiness
The sense of unworthiness, it seems, comes out of our being talked out of, trained out of, conditioned out of trusting our natural being. It is the result of being turned away from ourselves, taught to distrust ourselves.
We are worthy of letting go of our unworthiness. If we did nothing but practice letting go of unworthiness, much of the stuff we’re working so hard to clear away would have no support system. We would have more room to grow. Consciously we surrender unworthiness as it arises, not entertaining it with the ego’s list of credits. the work which will awaken us is that of becoming keenly aware of unworthiness without judging it. Gently, with patience and a lot of love, we acknowledge the being we really are. As a friend puts it, “Always try to see yourself through God’s eyes”.
Stephen Levine
Sunday Quote: Self care
Sit only under a tree that is full of blossoms.
Rumi
Like a mighty river
And that’s how we measure out our real respect for people – by the degree of feeling they can register, the voltage of life they can carry and tolerate – and enjoy. End of sermon. As Buddha says: live like a mighty river. And as the old Greeks said: live as though all your ancestors were living again through you.
Ted Hughes, 1930 – 1998, English Poet
No complaints
The weather is unusually disturbed and cold for this time of year, hailstones and frost….
As soon as the snow melts the grass begins to grow.
Even though the daytime high is barely above freezing, even
though May is very like November, marsh marigolds bloom
in the swamp and the popple trees produce a faint green
that hangs under the low clouds like a haze over the valley.
This is the way the saints live, no complaints, no suspicion,
no surprise.
If it rains, carry an umbrella, if it’s cold, wear
a jacket.
Louis Jenkins, American poet, 1942 -2019, Saints
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