When one door of happiness closes, another opens,
but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us.
Helen Keller
Tag: Mindfulness
The principle of nowness
The principle of nowness is very important to any effort to establish an enlightened society. You may wonder what the best approach is to helping society and how you can know that what you are doing is authentic and good. The only answer is nowness. The way to relax, or rest the mind in nowness, is through the practice of meditation. In meditation you take an unbiased approach. You let things be as they are, without judgment, and in that way you yourself learn to be.
Chogyam Trungpa
The real work
And I am thinking:
maybe just looking and listening is the real work.
Maybe the world, without us, is the real poem.
Mary Oliver
Which myth we live by
It is clear that many things have changed in Ireland in the time I have been abroad, such as the confidence placed in institutional elements such as government, banking and most especially the church. However, we never really get rid of our guiding myths, just simply replace them with others – new populist ideologies, fads and obsessions with fashions and celebrity leaders – which play a similar role.
The crises of the world are not just “out there” in the geopolitical sphere but “in here” in the individual soul. The questions, explanations and great rhythms that once guided the soul by way of living myth are still within us, still guiding our lives. And we are obliged to render this process more conscious lest we live blindly, false to ourselves and false to nature. . . . we must more consciously create our own myth or be enslaved to the myth of another.
James Hollis, Tracking the gods
photo Templemore abbey, Laurel Lodged
Sunday Quote: On not living with regret
When such as I cast out remorse, so great a sweetness flows into the breast
We are blest by everything, Everything we look upon is blessed.
W.B. Yeats, A Dialogue Of Self And Soul
A story about doing what is right
Once, the sage Tulsidas saw a scorpion that was struggling to escape from a river. The scorpion was about to drown, when Tulsidas reached over and saved it. The scorpion immediately stung Tulsidas. In shock, Tulsidas dropped the scorpion back into the waters, where it began struggling again to keep from drowning. Tulsidas again reached over and picked up the scorpion to save it from drowning. The scorpion stung Tulsidas once again. This happened three more times, before Tulsidas was finally able to toss the scorpion to safety in the wooded land around the river.
A man who had been watching this whole incident walked over to Tulsidas, and asked him, “Are you crazy?”
Tulsidas replied, “It is the scorpion’s nature to sting, and it is my nature to be helpful to all beings. If the scorpion keeps its nature even in the face of death, why should I give up my compassionate nature in the face of his sting?”
Photo: Per-Anders Olsson
