Tonight, a sadness came over me.
From having abandoned myself
for most of this very long day.
Entire chunks of time, lived but not really,
spent away lost in one task after the next.
Many good excuses for working away
still did not add up to much,
as far as the real truth is concerned.
Something that cannot be named
yearned to be attended to,
and now that I stop, grief in the heart.
Violence was done in the name of great aims.
A monk comes by my side
and looks at me with great gentleness.
Slow down, dear one, and take the time
to dwell outside of your office.
Unplug the computer, put away the iPhone,
and pay yourself a visit and sit long enough
to notice the steady flow of breath,
and the whole experience of this time, this place.
Do you ever feel that way, too?
Do you ever feel that way, too?
Posts
I LOVE this.
ReplyDeleteThank you.
Thank you. Yes, the subtleness of the relationship to oneself . . .
ReplyDeletehow common is the situation you paint.........of me.
ReplyDeleteIt starts in the morning...I resist...hopeless... The mind and all it has to do. The myriad things, all competing, crowding shouting.
On some days I just get up and sit. The silence seeps in ..... incredible beauty of silence. Slowly.....slowly, letting go, releasing, being.
Nothing doing, nothing to do - teacher tells me. I know but my attachment to all in this life punishes me.
I need to surrender, be simple.
The war continues. Sigh. Nothing to do.....
With much peace to all of you and you all.
Miro
Thank you, Miro for sharing your experience. Beauty of sangha, supporting one another to practice, first acknowledging common obstacles!
ReplyDeleteMay you continue to practice diligently.
With much metta,
marguerite
Marguerite -- I'm glad to have found your wonderful, thoughtful site. I often feel the way you describe in this post, and find, as you did, that patience, openness and faith are the keys to getting through it.
ReplyDeleteI know little about Buddhism practice, but feel drawn to its apparent principles and write about it in my own, everyman's way at One Man's Wonder.
Thanks for who you are and what you do!
Thank you Jeffrey. For your visit, and for sharing your practice.
ReplyDeleteI wish you well in your practice.
I like to pay myself visits.
ReplyDeleteBut sometimes I am gone for a long time.
For a long time, whenever I picked up my iPhone I would do a one-minute meditation before I did anything else on the phone. I have a little app on my phone for meditating :)
Often after the minute I would put down my phone or even doing another minute or more... I had picked up the phone/computer looking for connection, not realizing I really wanted to connect with myself. And even just that one minute had sufficed.