As we become more open, we might think that it's going to take bigger catastrophes to make us want to exit in our habitual ways. The interesting thing is that, as we open more and more, it's thie big ones that immediately wake us up and the little things that catch us off guard. However, no matter the size color, or shape of the catastrophe, the point is to continue to lean into the discomfort of life and see it clearly rather than try to protect ourselves from it.
In practicing meditation, we're not trying to live up to some kind of ideal---quite the opposite. We're just being with our experience, whatever it is. If our experience is that sometimes we have some kind of perspective, and sometimes we have none, then that's our experience. "This very moment is the perfect teacher" is really a most profound instruction. Just seeing what's going on---that's the teaching right there. We can be with what's happening and not dissociate. Awakeness is found in our pleasure and our pain, our confusion and our wisdom. It's available in each moment of our weird, unfathomable, ordinary everyday lives.
-Pema Chödrön
No comments:
Post a Comment