It is not uncommon for people to spend their whole life
waiting to start living.
Eckhart Tolle
Tag: Mindfulness
Walking in nature
Rumi advised me to keep my spirit
up in the branches of a tree and not peek
out too far, so I keep mine in the very tall
willows along the irrigation ditch out back,
a safe place to remain unspoiled by the filthy
culture of greed and murder of the spirit.
People forget their spirits easily suffocate
so they must keep them far up in tree
branches where they can be summoned any moment.
It’s better if you’re outside as it’s hard for spirits
to get into houses or buildings or airplanes.
Jim Harrison, 1937 – 2016), American poet, novelist, and essayist, Dead Man’s Float
Observe
So easy this week in Ireland, with beautiful Indian Summer days bathing the fields in light
Observe the wonders as they occur around you.
Don’t claim them. Feel the artistry
moving through, and be silent.
Rumi
Another moment, another chance
I know now,
after fifty years,
that the finding/losing, forgetting/remembering,
leaving/returning, never stops.
The whole of life is about another chance
Jeanette Winterson, Why be Happy when you Could Be Normal?
Being as is
The wise person man, perceiving wealth and craving,
Knows them to be empty illusion;
Food and clothes sustain our body and life;
But I advise you to learn
Being as is.
When it’s time, I leave my hermitage and go,
And there’s nothing to be left behind
Layman Pang, 740 – 808, Chinese Chan layman
Recognizing, not pursuing
In my life-long impatience, how much I have missed. Last night, washing the dishes, I really looked at my iron frying pan in the dishwater. The light made visible for a moment a tiny rainbow — a light through water revealing all the colors of life. It is so easy to miss the tiny symbols. Finding them is quite different from the business of trying to hatch up big symbolic experiences. It is recognition, not pursuit, of meaning — recognition of the sacramental, of the intersection of the two worlds, breaking through unsought because one is attending.
Helen Luke, 1904 – 1995, Jungian Analyst and writer
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