Tag: Life

Giving up the plan

Karl Duffy1 Comment

Almost every one of Odysseus’s encounters coming home from Troy are losses of some type – his men, his control, his power, his time, his memory, his fame, the boat itself. Falling, losing, failing, transgression and sin are the pattern, I am sorry to report.

Yet they all lead towards home.

In the end, we do not so much reclaim what is lost as discover a significantly new self in and through the process. Until we are led to the limits of our present game plan, and find it to be insufficient, we will not search out or find the real source, the deep well, or the constantly flowing stream

Richard Rohr, Falling Upward

The best advice

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Way back in the ’80s, my guru asked me, “What is stress?” He had never heard of stress because he came from the Himalayas. I told him stress is the perception of threat: physical, emotional and psychological. After a while, he said, “You mean resistance to existence.” And he said, “If you don’t resist existence, you will have flow.” That’s the best advice.

Deepak Chopra in Wall Street Journal, November 2024, Deepak Chopra Doesn’t Believe You’re Too Busy to Meditate

in mud, the lotus blooms

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There is a hard truth to be told:

before Spring becomes beautiful

it is plug ugly, nothing but mud and muck…

But in that muddy mess,

the conditions for rebirth are being created

Parker Palmer

Learn to live lightly

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We have to cultivate contentment with what we have.

We really don’t need much. When you know this, the mind settles down.

Cultivate generosity. Delight in giving.

Learn to live lightly.

In this way, we can begin to transform what is negative into what is positive. This is how we start to grow up.

Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo, No Excuses

The natural order

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Happy Saint Patrick’s Day

Estragon: He could dance first and think afterwards….
Vladimir: Would that be possible?
Pozzo: By all means…. It’s the natural order.

Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot

another prayer for these times

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O God, early in the morning I cry to you.
Help me to pray and gather my thoughts to you. I cannot do it alone.
In me it is dark, but with you there is light.
I am lonely, but you do not desert me.
My courage fails me, but with you there is help.
I am restless, but with you there is peace.
In me there is bitterness, but with you there is patience.
I do not understand your ways, but you know the way for me.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Lutheran pastor imprisoned and executed by Nazis.