As human beings we share a tendency to scramble for certainty whenever we realize that everything around us is in flux. In difficult times the stress of trying to find solid ground — something predictable to stand on — seems to intensify. But in truth, the very nature of our existence is forever in flux. Everything keeps changing, whether we’re aware of it or not.
Pema Chodron, The Fundamental Ambiguity of Being Human
photo USASOC news service
When we cannot see the whole picture, or do not understand what is unfolding, acceptance and trust are the best ways to proceed. Keeping the heart open and not closing down allows for growth and insight. We like to think that success in life depends on it unfolding in a clear way, when in reality, the capacity to live with what we don’t know is of greater importance. Can we live with a question without immediately trying to find the answer?
Seeing into darkness is clarity.
Knowing how to yield is strength.
Use your own light
and return to the source of light.
This is called practicing eternity.
Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching 52
photo : ceridwen
Not what you are, but what you do is the self.
The self appears in your deeds,
and deeds always mean relationships.
Jung, Seminar on Nietzsche’s Zarathustra
photo tsayrate
When we do the best that we can,
we never know what miracle is wrought in our life,
or in the life of another.
Helen Keller
photo alex proimos
We had a wild, wet and windy Sunday, and snow early this morning, and we see the reports of very cold weather in the US and in Eastern Europe. Always a useful way to practice – we see that we like to label our experience (“bad weather today”) and it also prompts us to reflect on how we are working with the changing conditions in our inner lives and in each day. as this quote from Toni Parker reminds us:
We call it “weather” but what is it really? Wind. Rain. Clouds slowly parting. Not the words spoken about it, but just this darkening, blowing, pounding, wetting, and then lightening up, blue sky appearing amidst darkness, and sunshine sparkling on wet grasses and leaves. In a little while there will be frost, snow and ice-covers. And then warming again, melting, oozing water everywhere. On an early spring day the dirt road sparkles with streams of wet silver. So — what is “weather” other than this incessant change of earthly conditions and all the human thoughts, feelings, and undertakings influenced by it: Like and dislike. Depression and elation. Creation and destruction? No entity “weather” to be found except in thinking and talking about it.
Now — is there such an entity as “me,” “I,” “myself?” Or is it just like the “weather” — an ongoing, ever-changing stream of ideas, images, memories, projections, likes and dislikes, creations and destructions, which thought keeps calling “I,” “me,” “Toni,” and thereby solidifying what is evanescent? What am I really, truly, and what do I think and believe I am? Are we interested in exploring this amazing affair of “myself” from moment to moment?
Toni Parker, The Wonder of Presence and the Way of Meditative Inquiry
We pray for the big things
and forget to give thanks for the ordinary, small (and yet really not small) gifts
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together
photo maxo
