If

Tuesday, February 11, 2014

If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you; If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too: If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies, Or being hated don't give way to hating, And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise; If you can dream---and not make dreams your master; If you can think---and not make thoughts your aim, If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same:. If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools; If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings, And never breathe a word about your loss: If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!" If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with Kings---nor lose the common touch, If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much: If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds' worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it, And---which is more---you'll be a Man, my son!

Rudyard Kipling

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Wild Geese

- Mary Oliver 

 

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
       love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting-
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Thursday, January 17, 2013

"to fight for each minute is to fight for what is possible within yourself, so that your life and your death will not be like theirs.”

― Charles Bukowski

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

"Remember to look up at the stars and not down at your feet.  Try to make sense of what you see and wonder about what makes the universe exist.  Be curious.  And however difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at.  It matters that you don't just give up."

- Stephen Hawking

“We are the cosmos made conscious and life is the means by which the universe understands itself.”

—

Brian Cox

There is no end to it.

Sunday, December 30, 2012

“Let me tell you a few things about regret...There is no end to it. You cannot find the beginning of the chain that brought us from there to here. Should you regret the whole chain, and the air in between, or each link separately as if you could uncouple them? Do you regret the beginning which ended so badly, or just the ending itself?”

― Janet Fitch, White Oleander

Peace, my heart...

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

"Peace, my heart, let the time for the parting be sweet.
Let it not be a death but completeness.
Let love melt into memory and pain into songs.
Let the flight through the sky end in the folding of the wings over the nest.
Let the last touch of your hands be gentle like the flower of the night.
Stand still, O Beautiful End, for a moment, and say your last words in silence.
I bow to you and hold up my lamp to light you on your way."

~Rabindranath Tagore

Opening my heart

Thursday, August 30, 2012

'It is the mind that closes the heart. The love, all of it is in the heart, all along. It is up to me to notice whenever the mind starts closing the door of the heart. The same mind that closed the door can also open it. It is up to me to intervene and keep the door open, giving myself the sweetness of fully open heart. '

Great post.

Thursday, July 19, 2012

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."
- Theodore Roosevelt

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

I Double Dare You

by Pavi Mehta

the edges of things are always deceptive.

because we are taught to believe

in endings and beginnings.

but the truth is:

There Are No Borders.

and all boundaries are lines

drawn in the imagination

(like the equator)

people like to put things

in their places.

(we believe in belonging

somewhere)

this is the problem with

poetry-

(it does not understand

belonging)

and it will not be put in place.

with crayons on paper maybe

but who can live life strictly

inside-the-lines?

the color of countries that

cannot be contained

in cliches where-

the red of your heart spills

into the red of the rose spills

into the red of the sunset spills

into mehendi on the hands of a bride.

and who can explain these things?

but what i want to know is simple:

who settled the sky on top of the mountain

and who drew the restless margins of the sea?

everything flows into everything

else.

like a picture drawn without once

lifting pencil from paper;

this world.

now tell me the story of your life

(whoever you are) go on

i Double Dare you!

tell me the story of your life

without once touching

mine.

On Negative Emotions, and "Control"

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

I found this quote today, and it speaks so much to thoughts that have been on my mind lately.

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket- safe, dark, motionless, airless–it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.”  – C.S. Lewis

I've been thinking about the nature of negative emotions - fear, anger, you name it.

Here is my assertion:  the genesis for all of our negative emotions and behaviors is our need to feel that we are in CONTROL.

To say it another way - negative emotions are a result of being confronted with the fact that reality refuses to conform to our expectations.

Man is a creature of habit.  We adore our routines.  We look for the expected.  We plan our lives.  We spend all our moments thinking about the past or planning the future.  We are either dwelling on the known or envisioning what is coming so that it can be known.  We abhor the unexpected.

We try to put everything into neatly defined boxes (safe, dark, motionless, airless)... And in the end, we try to preserve what we know (even, occasionally, at the expense of other information - perceptual set).  We try to exert CONTROL on all aspects of our lives, including each other.  The side effect is that we are constantly uncomfortable when things don't match our expectations, and we limit our experience of possibility by putting blinders on whenever possible to that which doesn't match our paradigms.  We are constantly suffocating and repressing the real, unpredictable, anarchistic reality.  And when we can't CONTROL it, we do our damnedest to define acceptable "boundaries" for it (as if that will change the reality!).

Isn't this ironic, given the impermanent nature of our existence and our never-ending state of change?  I am never as young as I was a second ago...  Things are in a constant state of flux.  There are always the two sides to the coin - a beginning and an ending, an ebb and a flow, a future constantly transitioning to become past.  Beyond this, there is the fractal-like fragmentation of "reality" - every person is "living their own dream" in the words of don Miguel Ruiz.  Most of the time we have no clue what someone else's dream (ideal CONTROLLED state) is.

Pema Chodron told a story in her Smile at Fear retreat (yet another Pema audio I've been enjoying).  She said that Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche was at a wedding, and he lightly rapped the bride and groom on the head with a fan, saying** "Pain is not Punishment", then "Pleasure is not Reward".  This was his wedding gift to the couple.  
(**NOTE/Disclaimer, I may not be remembering these precisely, but I believe this reflects the underlying meaning of the story)

So much of our pain is tied to our need to "understand" - to be able to categorize, analyze, contextualize, and define the things that happen - but Pain is not always Punishment!    Pain is caused by our own need to be able to apply clarity and boundaries to things (CONTROL).  We suffer when we are unable to do this.  But why do we need to do this?  What is the relevance of doing this?  There is no "static" state to be seen/documented/categorized.  All things are constantly shifting - as soon as we understand something it only limits and hinders us from being able to truly see and participate in an unknown future.  We create additional pain by bringing those contexts and assumptions we've derived to the next situation.  

Finally, we must know that, at best, it is only ever possible to have an ILLUSION of control (understanding/context).

Similarly - Pleasure is not Reward.  It is not happening "because" of us (Reward).  Just because something fits our mental model (you've at least convinced yourself that it does - see perceptual set reference above), does not make it "Right / Good".  The situation lived up to our illusion... This time.  That does not mean that our illusion is a "rule" that we can apply.

I have been practicing for the past couple of years to try to release my need to control.  To let go of my paradigms and expectations, and to look into my experiences with a state of curiosity - "I wonder what will happen now?".  I have been only moderately successful.  I don't know if I've fully realized WHY I need to let these chains go, but I am beginning to.

I'm not sure how to wrap this up into a neat little conclusion.  And, you know what?  Given the nature of this post, that's probably just fine.  Does that make you uncomfortable?

Love this.

Saturday, December 17, 2011

A Prayer for the World

Let the rain come and wash away the ancient grudges,
the bitter hatreds held and nurtured over generations.
Let the rain wash away the memory of the hurt, the neglect.
Then let the sun come out and fill the sky with rainbows.
Let the warmth of the sun heal us wherever we are broken.
Let it burn away the fog so that we can see each other clearly,
So that we can see beyond labels, beyond accents, gender or skin color.
Let the warmth and brightness of the sun melt our selfishness,
So that we can share the joys and feel the sorrow of our neighbors.
And let the light of the sun be so strong that we will see all
people as our neighbors.
Let the earth, nourished by rain, bring forth flowers to
surround us with beauty.
And let the mountains teach our hearts to reach upward to heaven.

- Rabbi Harold S. Kushner

Autumn

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

My dear friend Lisa shared this with me, and I think it is just beautiful and wanted to share it with you (and save it for myself for later).

Listening to Autumn

Autumn is slipping through summer’s branches

                and I am listening.

I am listening to the dying

                flowing forth from autumn’s being.

I am listening to the life

                hidden in the dying.

I am listening.

I am listening to the trees taking off their lush green garments.

I am listening to the trees turning, turning, ever turning.

I am listening to the burning bush of autumn.

I am listening to the falling of this season.

I am listening.

I am listening to the song of transformation,

to the wisdom of the season,

to the losses and the grieving,

to the turning loose and letting go.

I am listening to the surrender of autumn.

I am listening.

I am listening to the music of the forest’s undergrowth,

to the crunch of leaves beneath my feet,

to the miracle of crumbling leaves becoming earth again.

I am listening to the beauty and fragility of aging.

I am listening.

I am listening to the wheel of the year turning,

to the cycle of the seasons,

to the call for harmony and balance.

I am listening to the circle of life.

I am listening.

I am listening to days growing shorter,

to the air turning crisp and cool,

to the slow waning of light,

to the stars that shine in cold, dark nights.

I am listening to the growing harvest moon.

I am listening.

I am listening to happy harvest cries,

to hearts overflowing with thanksgiving,

to tables laden with gifts from the earth,

to baskets overflowing with fruit,

I am listening to the bountiful gift of autumn.

I am listening.

I am listening to a call for inner growth,

to my need to let go of material possessions,

to my need to reach out for invisible gifts.

I am listening to a call for transformation.

I am listening.

I am listening to the death of old ways.

I am listening to the life force turning inward.

I am listening to the renewal of the earth.

I am listening.

I am listening to summer

handing over to autumn.

I am listening to the poetry of autumn.

I am listening.

~ Macrina Wiederkehr

Yoda is a Buddhist

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” - Yoda

So there's a whole 'nother post that I'll work on about Yoda's belief system and how it reflects other religions near and dear to my heart. It's becoming more and more obvious to me that the source of most things hurtful is fear. I tap in to a bunch of resources about this - fear.less magazine (great), Brene Brown, Pema Chodron, and more.

But, actually, this blog post is really to talk more about faulty belief systems. I recently listened to Pema Chodron's talk, Don't Bite the Hook, on audio CD. I seem to be finding these messages all about me now - when the student is ready the teacher will appear, I suppose.

The most recent lesson I read on this was this post, courtesy of the awesome site Dumb Little Man, about taking the opportunity to shift your thinking to release yourself from frustration. The post describes how to stop and evaluate your angry thoughts as they happen. At the time that a situation came up that I could use this insight toward, I couldn't remember each of the steps it described, but the ones I remembered were to 1.) stop, 2.) evaluate whether your thought is true or not, and 3.) shift your thought to take ownership of the thing that is frustrating you or making you angry.

So I had the opportunity to practice this last night - what a great feeling! Here is the scenario: I'm going into the kitchen to make dinner, and all around the counters are coated in flour and cornmeal from John making us mini-pizzas for dinner the night before. He'd done a *lot* of work, and I must say that usually whoever cooks doesn't have to do the clean up, but he'd done all the dishes and really done 99% of the cleaning up, it was just a few areas that still had the signs of all the efforts of the prior nights' work. I was in the kitchen, getting ready to cook, and thinking "he should have cleaned up all this cornmeal! I mean, look, it is everywhere!"

I realized the faultiness and selfishness of my thoughts, seeing that he had cleaned up and done so much already. I stopped my thoughts, considered them (is this true?) and then turned it around to take ownership of it - changing "he should clean up..." to "I should clean up...", and began cleaning up. It was such a great and powerful feeling, and I knew that it was right; it is the way that I should be thinking, the right path.

I encourage you to think this way the next time you are frustrated with someone. Stop. Evaluate the thought (is this really true?). Turn it around and take ownership (from "he/she should..." to "I should..."). Free yourself from the shenpa!!

Have you encountered this? Would you try these techniques? Let me know!! I'd love to hear about others' experiences with this!

Are you feeding the right wolf?

Monday, January 4, 2010

"There was a story that was widely circulated a few days after the attacks of September 11, 2001, that illustrates our dilemma. A Native American grandfather was speaking to his grandson about violence and cruelty in the world and how it comes about. He said it was as if two wolves were fighting in his heart. One wolf was vengeful and angry, and the other wolf was understanding and kind. The young man asked his grandfather which wolf would win the fight in his heart. And the grandfather answered, 'The one that wins will be the one I choose to feed.'"

- from Taking the Leap, Freeing Ourselves from Old Habits and Fears by Pema Chödrön

I love this.

Thursday, June 25, 2009

This is a very meaningful quote for me. Its lessons are ones that challenge me. It is my struggle. It is my downfall. I include it here in hope that I will one day release myself.



The ego is a monkey catapulting through the jungle:
Totally fascinated by the realm of the senses,
it swings from one desire to the next,
one conflict to the next,
one self-centered idea to the next.
If you threaten it, it actually fears for its life.

Let this monkey go.
Let the senses go.
Let desires go.
Let conflicts go.
Let ideas go.
Let the fiction of life and death go.
Just remain in the center, watching

And then forget that you are there.

--Lao Tzu

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Success is not final,
failure is not fatal:
it is the courage to continue that counts.
~Winston Churchill

Monday, June 1, 2009

"The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don't go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you really want.
Don't go back to sleep.
People are going back and forth across the doorsill
where the two worlds touch.
The door is round and open.
Don't go back to sleep."

- Djalal ad-Din Rumi

Saturday, May 16, 2009

"And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music." -Friederich Nietzsche