Play

Once a day, take a moment to remember your real life’s work and differentiate it from the games you play in order to achieve it.

Then, commit to playing wholeheartedly…

I’ve mentioned the idea of using the word play to replace the word work. If you have no way to feel playful doing your work, get different work.

This is not to say that play is easy. Real creativity, which is the essence of play, can feel absolutely grueling. But ultimately there is a sense of joy and meaning in having done it. The essential self doesn’t mind hard work. But it will reject meaningless work.

Martha Beck Blog, I Rest my Pace

No add-ons

Neither planning ahead nor reminiscing about the past need obscure the clarity of our present awareness.

The Buddha would say “If you are planning ahead, just plan ahead. If you’re remembering, just remember”

We can look forward or back without fretting or obsessing, or allowing concerns about the future to constrict freedom in the present.

Think about it: even contemplating the future or the past is a function of present awareness

Lama Surya Das, Buddha Standard Time

When you rise

When you rise in the morning, give thanks for the light in your life, for your strength.

Give thanks for your food and for the joy of living.

If you see no reason to give thanks, the fault is in yourself.

Chief Tecumseh, Leader of the Shawnee, 1768 -1813

Sunday Quote: Simple

It is very simple to be happy,

but it is very difficult to be simple.

Rabindranath Tagore

Sunday Quote: to live

To live is the rarest thing in the world.

Most people exist, that is all.

Oscar Wilde

Amid the mess

What if the path to happiness is not

bringing order into the mess of our lives

but instead relaxing amid the mess

and rejoicing in its aliveness and beauty

Haemin Sunim, Korean Zen Buddhist Teacher, When Things Don’t go your Way