We have only now,
only this single eternal moment opening and unfolding before us,
day and night.
Jack Kornfield
Tag: Meditation
Moments to celebrate in life
Children, old people, vagabonds laugh easily and heartily:
they have nothing to lose and hope for little.
In renunciation lies a delicious taste of simplicity and deep peace.
Matthieu Ricard
photo kyle flood
Through the mist
It might be liberating to think of human life as informed by losses and disappearances just as much as by gifted appearances, allowing a more present participation and witness to the difficulty of living. What is real can never be fully taken away; its essence always remains. It might set us a little freer to believe that there is no path in life – in the low valley… or abroad in the mountain night – that does not lead to some form of heartbreak when the outer narrative disappears and then reappears in a different form. If we are sincere, every … relationship will break our hearts in order to enlarge our understanding of our self and that strange other with whom we have promised ourselves to the future. We learn, grow and become compassionate and generous as much through exile as homecoming; as much through loss as gain, as much through giving things away as in receiving what we believe to be our due.
David Whyte, The Poetic Narrative Of Our Times
photo lis burke
Relating to all
One of the most toxic new-age ideas is that we should “keep a positive attitude.” What a crazy, crazy idea that is. It is much healthier, much more healing, to allow yourself to feel whatever is coming up in you, and allow yourself to work with that anxiety, depression, grief. Because, underneath that, if you allow those feelings to come up and express themselves, then you can find the truly positive way of living in relationship to those feelings. That’s such an important thing…..It’s not about some “spiritual experience” of being high all the time. Not at all. It is about living with the ongoing stresses and strains and difficulties – and joys – of life, but doing so in a way that we feel whole. Living in relationship with the struggles of life is what makes us human.
Michael Lerner, The Difference between Healing and Curing
photo andrea westmorland
Life as it is
It would be great if life proceeded from one moment of perfect happiness to the next, but for most of us, this is not the case. So, just as Dante did, we must proceed by another path, the path through our personal hell, where we encounter moments of pain and feelings of loss and confusion. Given that this is so, you can either live in denial of the truth of your experience or obsess on your pains and disappointments. Or you can consciously accept, even embrace life not working out and trust that in doing so you will discover meaning in your life.
If you choose to consciously embrace pain and loss as your teachers, life itself is not disappointing; it is a series of moments to practice being with life as it is.
Philipp Moffitt, Living with Disappointment
Where to hold on
It seems to me that one of the key features of mindfulness is that it’s about bearing something in mind. You don’t exactly do letting go: What occurs – through carefully holding and moderating attention around a specific theme – is that the stuff that the mind projects is deprived of a foothold. So it lets go of its pre-occupations. To me, appropriate meditation practice is about aligning one’s attention to a specific object (breathing, body, mental image) and out of the store of moods, phobias and desires that the mind holds in its archives.
Ajahn Sucitto, The Low Point
Photo Arches National Park
