And, if I may say it in a very condensed way, it is precisely the godlike in ourselves that we are ambivalent about, fascinated by and fearful of, motivated to and defensive against.
This is one aspect of the basic human predicament, that we are simultaneously worms and gods.
Abraham Maslow, Towards a Psychology of Being
Mind can only create the qualities of good and bad by comparing. Remove the comparison, and there go the qualities. What remains is the pure unknown: ungraspable object, ungraspable subject, and the clear light of awareness streaming through.
The pivot of the Tao is the mind free of its thoughts. It doesn’t believe that this is a this or that that is a that. Let Yes and No sprint around the circumference toward a finish line that doesn’t exist. How can they stop trying to win the argument of life until you stop?
Stephen Mitchell, The Second Book of the Tao
In some fundamental way, happiness is found within, not in external circumstances, and we cannot give responsibility for it over to another person
So Ānanda, be your own island,
your own refuge,
with no other refuge
The Buddha’s Last Teaching, recorded in the Mahā-parinibbāna Sutta (sutra)
Early Spring growth is all around, reminding us to trust…
Settling, white dew
does not discriminate,
each drop its home.
Nishiyama Sōin, 1605 – 1682 Japanese poet, founder of the Danrin school of haikai poetry
The start of the season of Lent in the Christian tradition. The word Lent comes perhaps from the Old English and refers to the lengthening of the days in Spring. Most spiritual and wisdom traditions around the world have periods when we are encouraged to simplify things down to better see what is important or to dedicate more time to reflection and silence.
The past decade has seen an unparalleled assault on our capacity to fix our minds steadily on anything. To sit still and think, without succumbing to an anxious reach for a machine, has become almost impossible. The obsession with current events is relentless. We are made to feel that at any point, somewhere in the globe, something may occur to sweep away old certainties, something that, if we failed to learn about it instantaneously, could leave us wholly unable to comprehend ourselves or our fellows.…
The need to diet, which we know so well in relation to food, and which runs so contrary to our natural impulse, is something we now have to relearn in relation to knowledge, people and ideas.
We require periods of fast in the life of our minds no less than in that of our bodies.
Alian de Botton, School of life: Distraction-concentration
Life is completely still.
It is without excitement.
It is always still, indifferent to whether or not your life is dramatic
Joko Dave Haselwood, 1931 – 2014, Zen teacher
for Eimear and Brenton, who recently welcomed beautiful little Oscar into the world
Mindfulbalance 