We sometimes think we know the way we are going….
A person often meets his destiny on the road which he takes to avoid it
L‘homme rencontre souvent son destin sur la route qu’il emprunte pour l’éviter
Jean de la Fontaine, 1621 – 1695, French poet and writer of Fables
Thich Nhat Hahn from the Zen Tradition using the Christmas story as a way of teaching how to meditate:
I am going to remind you of the way to practice. First, “in” and “out.” It means that when I breathe in, I know I am breathing in. It’s easy. And when I breathe out, I know I am breathing out. I don’t mix the two things up. Breathing in, I know it is my in-breath. Breathing out, I know this is my out-breath. By that time, you stop all the thinking, you just pay attention to your in-breath and your out-breath. You are 100 percent with your in-breath and your out-breath.
It is like holding a baby in such a way that you hold it with 100 percent of yourself. Suppose this is a baby and I hold the baby like this. I hold the baby with 100 percent of myself. Remember, there are times when your mother holds you like this. Have you seen the image of the Virgin Mary holding the baby Jesus? She holds him like that: 100 percent. So here, our in-breath is our baby, and we hold our in-breath 100 percent. “Breathing in, I know that I am breathing in.” You just embrace your in-breath, nothing else. Don’t think of anything else. That is the secret of success.
Thich Nhat Hahn
It’s pointless to try to find peace through nullifying or erasing the sense world.
Peace only comes through not giving that world more substantiality or more reality than it actually possesses.
Ajahn Amaro
More on butterflies and lightness in dealing with the daily events, or more precisely, the thoughts they give rise to :
For years and years I struggled
just to love my life. And then
the butterfly
rose, weightless, in the wind.
“don’t love your life
too much,” it said,
and vanished into the world.
Mary Oliver, One or Two Things
photo andre engels
I think perfectionism is based on the obsessive belief that if you run carefully enough, hitting each stepping-stone just right, you won’t have to die. The truth is that you will die anyway and that a lot of people who aren’t even looking at their feet are going to do a whole lot better than you, and have a lot more fun while they’re doing it.
Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
photo Barney Moss
We spend all our energy and waste our lives trying to re-create zones of safety, which are always falling apart. That’s the essence of samsara – the cycle of suffering that comes from continuing to seek happiness in all the wrong places.
Pema Chodron, Comfortable with Uncertainty: 108 Ways Teachings on Cultivating Fearlessness and Compassion
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