In my room, the world is beyond my understanding;
when I walk I see
that it consists of
three or four hills and a cloud.
Wallace Stephens, Of the Surface of Things
Tag: Meditation
Kindness
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and to purchase bread
only kindness that raises its head
from the world to say
it is I you have been looking for
and goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.
Naomi Shihab Nye, Words from Under the Words
Allowing ourselves some quiet in our busy lives
Finding quiet time isn’t a luxury; it’s essential for protecting our health. It allows us to rest the body and the mind in a world that increasingly values speed and distraction.
After a pebble touches the surface of the river, it allows itself to sink slowly. It will reach the bed of the river without any effort. Once the pebble is at the bottom of the river, it continues to rest. It allows the water to pass by.
I think the pebble reaches the bed of the river by the shortest path because
it allows itself to fall without making any effort. During our sitting meditation we can allow ourselves to rest like a pebble. We can allow ourselves to sink naturally without
effort to the position of sitting, the position of resting.
Resting is a very important practice; we have to learn the art of resting. Resting is the first part of meditation. You should allow your body and your mind to rest. Our mind as well as our body needs to rest. The problem is that not many of us know how to allow our body and mind to rest. We are always struggling; struggling has
become a kind of habit.
When an animal in the jungle is wounded, it knows how to find a quiet place, lie down and do nothing. The animal knows that is the only way to get healed-to lay down and just rest, not thinking of anything, including hunting and eating. What it needs is to rest, to do nothing, and that is why its health is restored. In our consciousness there are wounds also, lots of pains. Our consciousness also needs to rest in order to restore itself. Our consciousness is just like our body. Our body knows how to heal itself if we allow it the chance to do so.
Thich Nhat Hahn
The cure for sadness
I know a cure for sadness:
Let your hands touch something that
makes your eyes smile.
I bet there are a hundred objects close by that can do that.
Look at beauty’s gift to us –
her power is so great she enlivens
the earth, the sky, our soul.
Mirabai
How nature heals
These beautiful autumn days touch the heart and the spirit. Simply being out in nature can heal and restore us, without the need for words or explanations or ideas.
We can learn from it as to how to be with someone who is going through a time of difficulty:
I was sad one day and went for a walk; I sat in a field.
A rabbit noticed my sadness and came near
It often does not take more than that to help at times –
to just be close to creatures who are so full of knowing
so full of love, that they don’t
chat
they just gaze with their marvellous understanding.
John of the Cross
Looking forward
Hope is a dimension of the soul … an orientation of the spirit, an orientation of the heart. It transcends the world that is immediately experienced and is anchored somewhere beyond its horizons. … It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense regardless of how it turns out.
Vaclav Havel
