Quiet friend who has come so far,
feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,
what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.
In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.
And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.
Sonnets to Orpheus, Part Two, XXIX — Rainer Maria Rilke
~
Let difficulty transform you. And it will. In my experience, we just need help in learning how not to run away.
~ Pema Chodron ~
What is Freedom?
But it’s not impermanence per se, or even knowing we’re going to die, that is the cause of our suffering, the Buddha taught. Rather, it’s our resistance to the fundamental uncertainty of our situation. Our discomfort arises from all of our efforts to put ground under our feet, to realize our dream of constant okayness. When we resist change, it’s called suffering. But when we can completely let go and not struggle against it, when we can embrace the groundlessness of our situation and relax into its dynamic quality, that’s called enlightenment, or awakening to our true nature, to our fundamental goodness. Another word for this is freedom—freedom from struggling against the fundamental ambiguity of being human.
Excerpted from:
Living Beautifully
with Uncertainty and Change
by Pema Chödrön
pages 6–7
~
“Many people, especially ignorant people, want to punish you for speaking the truth, for being correct, for being you. Never apologize for being correct, or for being years ahead of your time. If you’re right and you know it, speak your mind. Speak your mind. Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is still the truth.”
~ Gandhi ~
~
under the speaking truth moon waxing full, it is incumbent on us to trust the journey, to ponder Einstein’s question about whether we live in a friendly universe, to dance in stillness saying yes to the divine unfolding of mystery…
may our brokenheartedness break open our heart wider and deeper pouring out compassion…