Unmoored
in midnight water,
no waves, no wind,
the empty boat
is flooded with moonlight
Dogen, 1200 – 1253, founder of the Sōtō school of Zen.
Tag: Life
Stability and freedom
Do not pursue the past. Do not lose yourself in the future
The past no longer is. The future has not yet come.
Look deeply at life as it is.
In the very here and now the practitioner dwells in stability and freedom.
We must be diligent today. To wait until tomorrow is too late.
Death comes unexpectedly – How can we bargain with it
The sage calls the person who lives in mindfulness night and day “one who knows the better way to live”
The Buddha, Bhaddekaratta Sutta
Our endless stories
I wonder if we do not waste most of our energy
just by spending every waking minute saying hello to ourselves.
Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
Sunday Quote: Go Home
Go back and take care of yourself. Your body needs you, your feelings need you, your perceptions need you. The wounded child in you needs you. Go home and be there for all these things. Practice mindful walking and mindful breathing. Do everything in mindfulness so you can really be there, so you can love.
Thich Nhat Hanh
Make of yourself a light
In times of deep darkness, we not only need light — we need to be light for one another. That’s a message we must take to heart as we find ourselves lost once again in the all-too-familiar darkness of America’s culture of violence. Who better to deliver that message than Mary Oliver, in a powerful poem that re-tells the story of the Buddha’s last words. Before he died, she tells us, “He looked into the faces of that frightened crowd” and said, “Make of yourself a light.”
We are the frightened crowd the Buddha looked into as he drew his last breath. We are the people who need to be light for one another.
Parker Palmer
Where you are
You must love the crust of the earth on which you dwell.
You must be able to extract nutriment out of a sandheap.
You must have so good an appetite as this, else you will live in vain.
Thoreau
