Imagine you are walking in the woods and you see a small dog sitting by a tree. As you approach it, it suddenly lunges at you, teeth bared. You are frightened and angry. But then you notice that one of its legs is caught in a trap. Immediately your mood shifts from anger to concern: You see that the dog's aggression is coming from a place of vulnerability and pain. This applies to all of us. When we behave in hurtful ways, it is because we are caught in some kind of trap. The more we look through the eyes of wisdom at ourselves and one another, the more we cultivate a compassionate heart.
Stopping the endless pursuit of getting somewhere else is the perhaps most beautiful offering we can make to our spirit.
Feeling compassion for ourselves in no way releases us from responsibility for our actions. Rather, it releases us from the self-hatred that prevents us from responding to our life with clarity and balance.
All text, no title, no author. Happiness lies not in finding what is missing, but in finding what is present.
In any moment, no matter how lost we feel, we can take refuge in presence and love. We need only pause, breathe, and open to the experience of aliveness within us. In that wakeful openness, we come home to the peace and freedom of our natural awareness.
There is something wonderfully bold and liberating about saying yes to our entire imperfect and messy life.
Attention is the most basic form of love. By paying attention we let ourselves be touched by life, and our hearts naturally become more open and engaged.
When we put down ideas of what life should be like, we are free to wholeheartedly say yes to our life as it is.
Most of us need to be reminded that we are good, that we are lovable, that we belong. If we knew just how powerfully our thoughts, words, and actions affected the hearts of those around us, we’d reach out and join hands again and again. Our relationships have the potential to be a sacred refuge, a place of healing and awakening. With each person we meet, we can learn to look behind the mask and see the one who longs to love and be loved.
One of the stories that most struck me about the power of the recognizing and allowing, the ground level of RAIN, was a man that I met with at a retreat years ago, who was in the early stages of Alzheimer's. He was a psychologist, and he was an experienced meditator. So it's quite interesting to hear him speak about what he was going through. And he described an experience in the early onset, where he was giving a talk that included about meditation to about 100 people. And he was just about to begin, when he went completely blank. He had no idea, not only what he was supposed to say, but where he was, why all these expectant eyes were on him. So here's what he did. Actually, he didn't do anything. He paused, and then he just put his palms together, and he started naming what was coming up in him. So he would say, ""Confused,"" and then he'd just bow. ""Embarrassed,"" bow. ""Afraid,"" bow. ""Heart pounding,"" bow. He took a breath and he'd go, ""Breathing, breathing,"" bow. ""Relaxing."" He started settling. He looked around and he said, ""I'm sorry."" And as you might imagine, there a lot of people with tears in their eyes. One of the men in the group said, ""No one has ever given us the teachings in this way."" And what had he done? Instead of kind of tumbling into what might have been a habitual reactivity to a difficult situation, he paused, which is the beginning of all healing practices-- to stop. And then he began to recognize, just name what was happening. And his way of allowing was that simple bow that Jack has described in a number of examples and can-- it's the energy of a bow. It's respecting the actuality of what's right here, that life is like this right now. This is how it is. So sometimes when we recognize and allow what's going on, when we name it and let it be there, it loses its power. The identification or energy sort of dissolves, and we're and we've arrived back again. We've remembered presence. But often, if Mara has got a lot of juice-- if Mara is revved-- recognizing and allowing begins to wake up a healing attention, but there's still some energy there. And sometimes, when you name what's there and you allow it-- and I often use the word yes. So when you kind of say, ""Yes, this is the life,"" let it be here, it actually gives it permission to get stronger.
We wait for things to be different in order to feel okay with life. As long as we keep attaching our happiness to the external events of our lives, which are ever changing, we’ll always be left waiting for it.
Awakening from mistaken belief that it’s something outside ourselves. It’s right here. More we trust, the more we can manifest it. But we must shed the skin of the trance we live in. Niche says, “If a snake cannot shed its skin, it perishes.†This means letting go of old identity, thoughts, beliefs, story. It is a risk- no way to shed skin without opening up vulnerability How am I holding on to this skin? Where am I closed, defended?
Paying attention is the most basic and profound expression of love.
Imagine you are walking in the woods and you see a small dog sitting by a tree. As you approach it, it suddenly lunges at you, teeth bared. You are frightened and angry. But then you notice that one of its legs is caught in a trap. Immediately your mood shifts from anger to concern: You see that the dog's aggression is coming from a place of vulnerability and pain. This applies to all of us. When we behave in hurtful ways, it is because we are caught in some kind of trap. The more we look through the eyes of wisdom at ourselves and one another, the more we cultivate a compassionate heart.
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