Tag: Present moment

Stop counting

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It is not easy to free ourselves from the counting, comparing mind.

In this there is no measuring with time, a year doesn’t matter and ten years are nothing. Being an artist means: not numbering and counting but ripening like a tree, which doesn’t force its sap and stands confidently in the storms of spring, not afraid that afterward summer may not come.

It does come. But it comes only to those who are patient, who are there as if eternity lay before them, so unconcernedly silent and vast. I learn it every day of my life, learn it with pain I am grateful for: patience is everything!


Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet, Letter 3

Slow growing fruition

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For autumn and its slow growing fruition
For that season of ultimate rise and fall
We give thanks.
May we gracefully rise to the occasion of our own falling,
Giving ourselves just enough time to go beyond time
To the great Now
At the quiet center of the turning wheels.

David Steindl-Rast, osb, Thanksgiving Song

Don’t separate yourself

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Simply be with what’s here.

Shinzan Roshi, my teacher constantly uses the Japanese term “nari kiru” to express what we do here. “Nari” means literally “become” and “kiru” means “totally” or “completely”. So once you find tension or stress, don’t separate yourself from it; quite the opposite, be with it, become it. In that moment there is no gap between you and the sensation.

Julian Daizan Skinner and Sarah Bladen, Practical Zen for Health, Wealth and Mindfulness

New

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This is a wonderful day.

I’ve never seen this one before

Maya Angelou

Sunday Quote: Peace

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You can manage your mind in three primary ways:

Let be

Let go

Let in

Rick Hanson

For everything there is a season

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The Autumn Equinox in the Northern Hemisphere.

If you feel like you’re running out of time, read this: You’re not. …there isn’t a designated time in life for anything, and although it’s hard not to, your timeline shouldn’t be compared to the person standing next to you. Just because the timing was right for them, doesn’t mean it would be right for you. There is enough happiness, love, and opportunity to go round, no matter when it happens. Your life shouldn’t feel like a race, because it isn’t one. Where there are fast days, there should be slow days that follow, days where you can reflect and recalibrate because everything you are going through right now is preparing you for the next chapter, every challenge directly informing the decisions that you’re about to make for yourself.

Being present will show you what is worth taking with you along the way as you navigate life because the destination won’t bring you peace unless you let the journey teach you who you are, and just how much capacity you have to experience change, both within yourself and in the world. You aren’t running out of time, so don’t be afraid to slow down. Things fall into place when we create space for them to.

Seyda Noir