Tag: Life

The Basics of practice 2: Be patient with the mind

Karl Duffy2 Comments

File:Monkey Leap.jpg

The biggest hindrance to (mindfulness) is constant intrusive thoughts. This is normal for everyone and from the beginning you should expect it. The nature of our mind is to think, and it is childish to imagine that we can simply turn that process off when we wish to.

Our minds have been almost completely out of control for most of our life. Recognizing this can help us to be practical and patient — it may take us some time and a lot of skillful practice to tame the crazy “monkey mind.”

Bob Sharples

photp mahbub shaheed

What is not essential

Karl Duffy1 Comment

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Each person is born with an unencumbered spot, free of expectation and regret, free of ambition and embarrassment, free of fear and worry. To know this spot of inwardness is to know who we are, not by surface markers of identity, not by where we work or what we wear or how we like to be addressed, but by feeling our place in relation to the Infinite and by inhabiting it. This is a hard lifelong task, for the nature of becoming is a constant filming over of where we begin, while the nature of being is a constant erosion of what is not essential. Each of us lives in the midst of this ongoing tension, growing tarnished or covered over, only to be worn back to that incorruptible spot of grace at our core.

Mark Nepo, Unlearning Back to God

Letting life’s lessons sink in

Karl Duffy1 Comment

allondon1 rocks

Another post inspired by the season of Lent, but a reminder for all of the value in slowing down, making space, “meandering” in life, rather than always focusing on driven, purpose-filled activities.

More than giving up or self-denial, Lent, when practiced intentionally, can allow time for self-examination, reflection, and preparation. It’s a time of slowing down, intentionally, so that life is given a chance to sink in, not just run off in so many directions. Induced meandering, if you will.  The slowing that is an inherent part of Lent is not just for the sake of slowing down, but so that life can sink in. In so doing, this season of irrigation provides health and vitality long after its rains have passed. Lent offers us an opportunity to slow down, to meander rather than to rush, to allow life to sink in a bit, to find ways to go deeper and not always stay on the surface. A time to observe, to pay attention, and then to act — and in so doing provide the space to move from rush to replenish. When we take this practice seriously, we plant its blessings so that they benefit not only us in our lives for this season, but also extend to the world around us.

Erin Dunigan, The Induced Meandering of the Lenten Season

Moment by moment

Karl Duffy2 Comments

File:Child pushing grandmother on plastic tricycle.jpg

We do not remember days,

We remember moments

Cesare Pavese 1908 – 1950 Italian poet and novelist

photo Catherine Scott

In its own time

Karl Duffy5 Comments

sycamore

There is no expected pace for inner learning. What we need to learn comes when we need it, no matter how old or young, no matter how many times we have to start over, no matter how many times we have to learn the same lesson. We fall down as many times as we need to , to learn how to fall and get up. We fall in love as many times as we need to , to learn how to hold and be held. We suffer pain as often as is necessary for us to learn how to break and how to heal. No one really likes this of course, but we deal with our dislike in the same way, again and again, until we learn what we need to know about the humility of acceptance.

Mark Nepo, The Book of Awakening

Sunday Quote: Quiet in heart

Karl Duffy2 Comments

We pray, not for new earth or heaven, but to be
quiet in heart, and in eye, clear.

What we need is here.

Wendell Berry

photo rspb