Tag: Present moment

The heart of practice….

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One learns only one thing,

how to rejoice in life.

Osho

Walking in nature these days

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Walk around feeling like a leaf
know you could tumble at any second.

Then decide what to do with your time.

Naomi Shihab Nye

A way to claim courage

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The on-the-spot practice of being fully present, feeling your heart and greeting the next moment with an open mind can be done at any time: when you wake up in the morning, before a difficulty conversation, whenever fear or discomfort arises. This practice is a beautiful way to claim… your courage, your kindness, your kindness, your strength. Whenever it occurs to you, you can pause briefly, touch in with how you’re feeling both physically and mentally, and then connect with your heart – even putting your hand on your heart if you want to. This is a way of extending warmth and acceptance to whatever is going on for you right now.

Pema Chodron, Living Beautifully with Uncertainty and Change

Reflecting on time as the clocks “go back” 2

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We must slow down to a human tempo and we’ll begin to have time to listen. And as soon as we listen to what’s going on, things will begin to take shape by themselves. This is what the Zen people do. They give a great deal of time to doing whatever they need to do. That’s what we have to learn when it comes to meditation. We have to give it time . . . The best way to [do it] is: Stop.

Thomas Merton

Knowing the moment

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Mindfulness knows what is going on outside, and also, inside our own skin. However we experience life, through whichever sense gate life comes to us – eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, even the mind itself – mindfulness is capable of knowing that seeing, or hearing, or smelling, or tasting, or feeling, or even thinking – is happening in this, the present moment.

So, we can practice mindfulness and become more present. All we have to do is to establish attention in the present moment, and to allow ourselves to be with what is here. To rest in the awareness of what is here. To pay attention without trying to change anything. To allow ourselves to become more deeply and completely aware of what it is we are sensing! And to be with what it is we are experiencing. To rest in this quality of being, of being aware, in each moment as our life unfolds. And, to the extent we can practice “being” and become more present and more aware of our life and in our life, the “doing” we do about all of it, will be more informed, more responsive, and less driven by the habits of reaction and inattention.

Jeffrey Brantley

Waiting for life to begin

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We think that happiness is only possible in the future – when we get a house, a car, a Ph.D. We struggle in our mind and body, and we don’t touch the peace and joy that are available right now – the blue sky, the green leaves, the eyes of our beloved.

Thich Nhat Hahn