Tag: Stress Reduction

Here and Now

Karl Duffy4 Comments

https://i0.wp.com/i.imgur.com/zv8u0X3.jpg

Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes

Trust

Karl Duffy2 Comments

File:Lamplight in St David's - geograph.org.uk - 1441352.jpg

When we cannot see the whole picture, or do not understand what is unfolding,  acceptance and trust are the best ways to proceed. Keeping the heart open and not closing down allows for growth and insight. We like to think that success in life depends on it unfolding in a clear way, when in reality, the capacity to live with what we don’t know is of greater importance. Can we live with a question without immediately trying to find the answer?

Seeing into darkness is clarity.
Knowing how to yield is strength.
Use your own light
and return to the source of light.
This is called practicing eternity.

Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching 52

photo : ceridwen

Not always running

Karl Duffy2 Comments

File:People Shadow.JPG

There was a man who was so disturbed by the sight of his own shadow and so displeased with his own footsteps that he determined to get rid of both. The method he hit upon was to run away from them. So he got up and ran. But every time he put his foot down there was another step, which his shadow kept up with him without the slightest difficulty.

He attributed his failure to the fact that he was not running fast enough. So he ran faster and faster, without stopping, until he finally dropped dead.

He failed to realize that if he merely stepped into the shade, his shadow would vanish, and if he sat down and stayed still, there would be no more footsteps.

Thomas Merton, The Way of Chuang Tzu

 

Little pieces of heaven

Karl Duffy3 Comments

File:Finnish rocking chair.JPG

A beautiful description of what meditation time is: an act of kindness towards ourselves, a time when we do not have to be anything or get anywhere. We can allow trouble and judgment to be busy somewhere else, while we allow ourselves be supported and held in a kinder space.

Just lying on the couch and being happy.
Only humming a little, the quiet sound in the head.
Trouble is busy elsewhere at the moment, it has
so much to do in the world.

People who might judge are mostly asleep; they can’t
monitor you all the time, and sometimes they forget.
When dawn flows over the hedge you can
get up and act busy.

Little corners like this, pieces of Heaven
left lying around, can be picked up and saved.
People wont even see that you have them,
they are so light and easy to hide.

Later in the day you can act like the others.
You can shake your head. You can frown.

William Stafford, Any Morning

Learning

Karl Duffy5 Comments

File:Leri embankment, Borth - geograph.org.uk - 15104.jpg

Suffering is our best teacher because it hangs onto us and keeps us in its grip until we have learned that particular lesson. Only then does suffering let go. If we haven’t learned our lesson, we can be quite sure that the same lesson is going to come again, because life is nothing but an adult education class. If we don’t pass in any of the subjects, we just have to sit the examination again. Whatever lesson we have missed, we will get it again. That is why we find ourselves reacting to similar situations in similar ways many times.

Ayya Khema, Being Nothing,  Going Nowhere

photo nigel callaghan

Where to hold on

Karl DuffyLeave a comment

File:Climbing, Owl Rock (6550009887).jpg

It seems to me that one of the key features of mindfulness is that it’s about bearing something in mind. You don’t exactly do letting go: What occurs – through carefully holding and moderating attention around a specific theme – is that the stuff that the mind projects is deprived of a foothold. So it lets go of its pre-occupations. To me, appropriate meditation practice is about aligning one’s attention to a specific object (breathing, body, mental image) and out of the store of moods, phobias and desires that the mind holds in its archives.

Ajahn Sucitto, The Low Point

Photo Arches National Park