the cost of war on our souls is too high to estimate. we should meditate on this.
in some ways we all bear the cost of war, but none more than those and the families of those who have sacrificed their lives in service. to them we should offer our deepest prayers and heartfelt gratitude. and it is to them and our children that we owe our pledge to work tirelessly for peace and an end to war.
~j
#MemorialDay2016 #gratitude #peace #meditation
My work is loving the world.Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird
equal seekers of sweetness.
Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.
Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.
Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?
Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect? Let me
keep my mind on what matters,
which is my work,
which is mostly standing still and learning to be
astonished.
The phoebe, the delphinium.
The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.
Which is mostly rejoicing, since all the ingredients are here,
which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
and these body-clothes,
a mouth with which to give shouts of joy
to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,
telling them all, over and over, how it is
that we live forever.
~ Mary Oliver
#love #OurPurpose #WorkToDo #gratitude #awe #BeginnersMind #MaryOliver
Happy Thanksgiving, friends 🙏🏻
the following is a meditation on gratitude and joy, by Jack Kornfield…
enjoy ~j
“If we cannot be happy in spite of our difficulties, what good is our spiritual practice?”
~Maha Ghosananda
Buddhist monks begin each day with a chant of gratitude for the blessings of their life. Native American elders begin each ceremony with grateful prayers to mother earth and father sky, to the four directions, to the animal, plant, and mineral brothers and sisters who share our earth and support our life. In Tibet, the monks and nuns even offer prayers of gratitude for the suffering they have been given: “Grant that I might have enough suffering to awaken in the deepest possible compassion and wisdom.”
The aim of spiritual life is to awaken a joyful freedom, a benevolent and compassionate heart in spite of everything.
Gratitude is a gracious acknowledgment of all that sustains us, a bow to our blessings, great and small, an appreciation of the moments of good fortune that sustain our life every day. We have so much to be grateful for.
Gratitude is confidence in life itself. It is not sentimental, not jealous, nor judgmental. Gratitude does not envy or compare. Gratitude receives in wonder the myriad offerings of the rain and the earth, the care that supports every single life.
As gratitude grows it gives rise to joy. We experience the courage to rejoice in our own good fortune and in the good fortune of others.
Joy is natural to an open heart. In it, we are not afraid of pleasure. We do not mistakenly believe it is disloyal to the suffering of the world to honor the happiness we have been given.
Like gratitude, joy gladdens the heart. We can be joyful for people we love, for moments of goodness, for sunlight and trees, and for the breath within our breast. And as our joy grows we finally discover a happiness without cause. Like an innocent child who does not have to do anything to be happy, we can rejoice in life itself, in being alive.
Let yourself sit quietly and at ease. Allow your body to be relaxed and open, your breath natural, your heart easy. Begin the practice of gratitude by feeling how year after year you have cared for your own life. Now let yourself begin to acknowledge all that has supported you in this care:
With gratitude I remember the people, animals, plants, insects, creatures of the sky and sea, air and water, fire and earth, all whose joyful exertion blesses my life every day.
With gratitude I remember the care and labor of a thousand generations of elders and ancestors who came before me.
I offer my gratitude for the safety and well-being I have been given.
I offer my gratitude for the blessing of this earth I have been given.
I offer my gratitude for the measure of health I have been given.
I offer my gratitude for the family and friends I have been given.
I offer my gratitude for the community I have been given.
I offer my gratitude for the teachings and lessons I have been given.
I offer my gratitude for the life I have been given.
Just as we are grateful for our blessings, so we can be grateful for the blessings of others.
Continue to breathe gently. Bring to mind someone you care about, someone it is easy to rejoice for. Picture them and feel the natural joy you have for their well-being, for their happiness and success. With each breath, offer them your grateful, heartfelt wishes:
May you be joyful.
May your happiness increase.
May you not be separated from great happiness.
May your good fortune and the causes for your joy and happiness increase.
Sense the sympathetic joy and caring in each phrase. When you feel some degree of natural gratitude for the happiness of this loved one, extend this practice to another person you care about. Recite the same simple phrases that express your heart’s intention.
Then gradually open the meditation to include neutral people, difficult people, and even enemies- until you extend sympathetic joy to all beings everywhere, young and old, near and far.
This excerpt is taken from the book, “The Art of Forgiveness, Lovingkindness, and Peace“
as I grow in this practice, I’m beginning to become aware that “reverence” begins even at the cellular level and is born out of gratitude.
am I grateful for the cells in my body? that I may see? that I may walk and write? that I may eat and digest? that I may think and speak?
in my gratitude, do I honor these cells? do I smile to them, breathing in and out, as Thich Nhat Hanh says? do I watch what I feed them, including the thoughts and emotions I cling to?
do I see them as the life that they are and honor that life within them? a life they are living, making it so that I may live?
this passing body is more them, than it is “me.” have we thought about that?
and we can ask ourselves, how am I honoring this gift? how am I embodying this gratitude I feel swelling in my chest? how am I living with reverence in the short time I am here? and how can I extend this to others in this delicate, beautiful, passing life?
~j
11.16.15
#reverence #life #gratitude #practice #peace #ThichNhatHanh #meditation #mindfulness #TheMettaGarden #JMW
“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
life is fleetingeach moment a gift
our only response is gratitude
manifest in love
pay attention
“One of the great insights we can get from mindfulness meditation practice is that each moment of experience arises and passes. Having a direct experience of this impermanence, from observing awareness, helps us let go of the attempt to calcify any single moment of time, to try to make something stable that is not.”
~ Loch Kelly
#impermanence #life #gift #gratitude #love
there is pain, there is sadness.there is also the delicate beauty which pervades all things, bearing witness to love.
Where shall you make your home and lay your head to rest?
~j
#perspective #beauty #love #life #pain #sadness #tao #home #choices #openness #rest #gratitude
“The significance is hiding in the insignificant. Appreciate everything.” ~ Eckhart Tolle
#gratitude #interconnection #NothingInsignificant #LoveAllLife #life #compassion #kindness #gentleness #tao #bodhicitta #bodhisattva #insects #beetle #nature
“Just to be alive is enough.”
~ Suzuki Roshi
…easy to forget. peace-giving, perspective balancing, grateful to remember…
#gratitude #abide #zen #gift #life #SuzukiRoshi
The Metta Garden 