Dia de los Muertos

  
Dia de los Muertos
a day to reflect on those who have passed, but haven’t left us. a lifting of the veil revealing that we are all One, interconnected through space and time, life and death, in this always moving ground of Being. through memory and ritual, offering prayers of honor, respect and gratitude.
the theme of death is an integral part of Buddhist practice, not as some morbid practice – but practice for what is inevitable and a sacred part of life. something we so desperately try to avoid in our culture, namely – sickness, aging, and dying – change.
practicing “death” is practicing “life.” each out breath is a death and each in breath is life reborn. an opportunity to be grateful for, an opportunity to continue this adventure of learning to love better and open our hearts.
perhaps this is what our loved ones, who have passed, are trying to tell us.
~j
“In trying to deny that things are always changing, we lose our sense of the sacredness of life. It’s easy to forget that life and death are part of the natural scheme of things, intrinsic to our lives in an eternally shifting universe.”

~ Ronna Kobatznick
#DiaDeLosMuertos

#life #death #practice #love #meditation #buddhism #interdependence #change #family #relationships #ghosts

just this! just This!

  

just this! just This!~j
Don’t prolong the past,

Don’t invite the future,

Don’t alter your innate wakefulness,

Don’t fear appearances.

Apart from that,

there is not a damn thing!

~ Dzogchen Master Patrul Rinpoche

(1808-1887)
#tibetan #buddhism #BuddhistQuotes #JustThis #zen #enso #EnsoArt #JMWart

together we wake up…

  

Somewhere this very moment, 

babies are born, fathers are dying, mothers are grieving. 

Yet, pervading all is a 

groundless awareness, 

delicate and strong at the same time. Everything becomes we, 

a beating heart with a 

transparent, radiant smile. 

And we are awake

 ~Judith Simmer-Brown

Peace Day…

  

 

“They make a wasteland they call it peace.”~ Tacitus
do we want peace? 

if yes, then we begin today in this moment with this very breath to be peace. we do this through gentleness in word and action, kindness born out of a desire to serve the common good, planting seeds of kindness and compassion now, benefiting the present moment and our present relationships, while contributing to a better tomorrow for all of life.

this doesn’t happen in the future, it happens now. we do this to honor the life we have been given, living peace now, which is the future. 

~j
#PeaceDay

listening…

  

if what is presented in Buddhism -that we are interconnected and all things are impermanent and changing – is indeed true, then our most grateful and honorable response is to aspire to and practice toward authentic engagement with life. in other words…Presence. to be Present, we can practice a most beneficial skill…Listening. and the first step toward skillful listening is to stop talking.
~j
#RightListening #StopTheChatter #presence #relationships #communication #practice #listening #authenticity #ThisMoment #impermanence #interconnection #change #life #meditation #Buddhism 

wake up…

  

“The teachings of Buddhism are directed at people who don’t have a lot of time to waste. That includes all of us, whether we’re aware of it or not. From the point of view of the teachings, thinking that we have ample time to do things later is the greatest myth, the greatest hang-up, and the greatest poison. That, along with our continual, deep-seated tendency to try to get away from what we are doing, clouds our perceptions and our thinking. 
If we knew that tonight we were going to go blind, we would take a longing, last real look at every blade of grass, every cloud formation, every speck of dust, every rainbow, raindrop—everything. If we knew we were going to go deaf tomorrow, we would treasure every single sound we heard. The teachings try to scare us into waking up to how little time there is and to the preciousness of human birth.”
~ Pema Chödrön

Happy Birthday to His Holiness The Dalai Lama!

a wise and beneficial birthday message/gift for us from His Holiness The Dalai Lama on his birthday.
HH Dalai Lama Birthday Message
on a side note: yesterday i had the great pleasure of seeing His Holiness give a public talk in the afternoon around noon. you know what time he got up that day? 1am. at 80 years old and after a full day the previous day, he got up at 1am for his 4 hours of prayers and meditation, then spoke at a breakfast, did interviews, had lunch, and then gave a public talk that went until 3:30pm. he had energy, humor and clarity while delivering a much needed message on compassion, education and art. so impressive and generous! happy birthday your Holiness, deep bows of gratitude and a vow to contribute to this compassion movement!!

#HHDL80 #WithCompassion

Oh this life, this life!

  
“Buddha told a parable in a sutra:

A man traveling across a field encountered a tiger. He fled, the tiger after him. Coming to a precipice, he caught hold of the root of a wild vine and swung himself down over the edge. The tiger sniffed at him from above. Trembling, the man looked down to where, far below, another Tiger was waiting to eat him. 

Two mice, one white and one black, little by little started to gnaw away the vine. The man saw a luscious strawberry near him. Grasping the fine with one hand, he plucked the strawberry with the other. How sweet it tasted!”
~ a Zen parable as retold in the book, “Zen Flesh Zen Bones: A Collection of Zen and Pre-Zen Writings” compiled by Paul Reps and Nyogen Senzaki

the experience of our life as it is…

  

“…disasters do happen and our pictures of how our life should be are blown away. Then we have a choice: do we face the disaster directly and make it our practice or do we run once again, learning nothing and compounding our difficulties? If we want a life that’s peaceful and productive, what do we need? We need the ability (which we learn slowly and unwillingly) to be the experience of our life as it is.”
~ Charlotte Joko Beck