Tag: Mindfulness

The key to balance

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More wisdom, this time from the Taoism tradition, on keeping our sense of self fluid:

Can you call your mind back from its wandering
and keep to its original oneness?
Can you concentrate the energy of life
and keep it supple like a newborn child?

Can you deal with the most vital matters
by letting events take their course?
Can you step back from your own mind
and in this way understand all things?

Giving birth and nourishing,
having without possessing,
acting with no expectations,
leading and not trying to control:
this is the supreme virtue.

Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, 10

photo amolnaik3k

Happiness and not judging anything

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File:St Macarius the Great with Cherub.jpg

Some of the early Christian Desert Fathers saying are almost  Zen-like in their simplicity. In this example we find echoes of yesterdays post. It contains an instruction on what leads to us being content –  finding rest from our inner agitations: Turn the mind away from judgments, either about ourselves or others, keep the self fluid and in this way stop sticking labels on what is happening. Good advice for today.

Abba Poeman said to Abba Joseph, “Tell me how to become a monk”

He said, “If you want to find rest here below…in all circumstances say ‘who am I’ and do not judge anyone”

Why we get no rest

Karl Duffy2 Comments

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The mind never stops looking for identity and  this identity always defines itself through attributes: “the beautiful  one”, “the smart one”, “the creative one”,  “the successful one”… We are always searching for something to be.

Dzigar Kongtrul,  Light Comes Through

Sunday Quote: Deep within

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Keep your feet on the top of the mountain

and sound deep to that

of God in everyone

George Fox, 1624 – 1691, founder of the Society of Friends (Quakers)

With thanks to Cilla at http://www.weaversjournal.wordpress.com for the thought

photo wyldnthewoods

Remaining astonished by life

Karl Duffy1 Comment

tearmann

It seems to me that almost all our sadnesses are moments of tension,

which we feel as paralysis because

we no longer hear our astonished emotions living.

Rilke, Letter to a Young Poet

photo of the coffee shop in Kilcullen, called An Tearmann,  which is Irish for “Refuge” or “Sanctuary”

We never know the full picture

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File:Shes right on track (5400068317).jpg

At the center of his existence man is unknown to himself and must remain so,

for that part of being that calls itself man could be known fully

only if the community of being and its drama in time were finally known as a whole.

Eric Voegelin, American political philosopher, 1901 – 1985

photo bert kaufman