Tag: Life

A letting go practice

Karl Duffy2 Comments

November is the month of letting go of what is no longer needed or has fulfilled its purpose, just as trees now release the last season’s leaves. In China, an old proverb speaks to this: “Give away, throw away or move 27 items for nine days and your life will change.” The practice of letting go teaches us about non-attachment. The process of releasing or emptying provides room for new possibilities, opportunities, and blessings to enter our lives. In November we can readily see how much we have to be thankful for compared to our troubles and dissatisfactions. As we extend gratitude for the bounty and goodness that are present in our lives, any pockets of ingratitude that once seemed large in our imaginations become dwarfed- nearly nonexistent. 

Angeles Arrien 1940 – 2014, Cultural anthropologist.

The driving force

Karl Duffy5 Comments

 

Today, November 2nd, is traditionally the day that we remember those close to us who have died and gone before us

All men should strive to learn before they die,

what they are running from,

and to, and why.

James Thurber

In our darkest night

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No seed ever sees the flower.

Zen saying

 November is the beginning of Winter in the Celtic Calendar and so today signals the beginning of the “darker half” of the year. The balance between light and darkness continues to shift. In the northern hemisphere the earth becomes colder and nature more dormant. Similar processes can occur in our lives. For example, we can choose to go with the rhythm of nature and become more reflective in this period, slowing down and simplifying things. Or our lives can have parts that seem dormant and not going anywhere. Or maybe difficulties are occurring which can seem dark and we see no escape.  However, darkness does not mean that nothing is happening.  I really like this saying from the Zen tradition – things that are now hidden or buried will eventually be seen or bear fruit.  That what is now just germinating will be full of life in time. As humans we like to see immediate results. However, for now, all we can do is wait and trust. Peace comes from knowing the right way to let go. 

Sunday Quote: Kindness

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Modern society prizes intelligence, achievements or efficiency…

What wisdom can you find

that is greater than kindness?

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Quelle sagesse trouverez-vous supérieure à la bonté?

We rush through the day, we miss so much

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Another Autumn Saturday, two more poets.

Very foggy all day yesterday, a good metaphor for how we live our lives sometimes. 

Sometimes the mountain
is hidden from me in veils
of cloud, sometimes
I am hidden from the mountain
in veils of inattention, apathy, fatigue,
when I forget or refuse to go
down to the shore or a few yards
up the road, on a clear day,
to reconfirm
that witnessing presence.

Denise Levertov, Witness. 

Instructions for living a life: Pay attention. Be astonished.

Mary Oliver, Sometimes      

The place from which all other parts are named

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It is always a trauma for the human psyche when those elements it has over-invested itself in at the periphery of life are withdrawn, and the spring-like world of growth and opportunity seems to close down, as if the old currencies have become worthless while we as yet do not know how to value or harvest the following season. But this form of trauma has also been seen by many of our great religious, contemplative and artistic traditions as an invitation back to another kind of valuation, a return to a more internal focus, an opportunity to revive an old friendship with the place from which all the peripheries are recognized, priced and named. This internal, alchemical, almost catalytic core of identity-making and decision-making has long been associated with the soul of an individual; the part of us attempting to belong to the world in the biggest way it can; the part that witnesses our outer actions, stirs our conscience and quite often seems to be at odds with those other parts of us trying to game the system at the periphery.

David Whyte