Within all the disturbance and discomfort and dis-ease and disease we are currently experiencing, I have become increasingly grateful for having found a path of spiritual life that gives me not only a context and a basket that holds everything, a basket I can put fear, worry, doubt and apprehension in; and from which I can take out the solution to those same worries, etc.

A mystical basket that has great depth and is also a very practical one because it offers refuge, understanding and a way to be with what I may perceive as negative aspects of life. Seen from a distance that allows some space between my feelings and reality. That space is impartiality.

I don’t have to choose a position on anything. Although I always have choices. Hmmmmm? When I take a position my view is altered and my choices biased.

When I try to stay closer to the middle (center) I can see situations and life in a more balanced way and perhaps be more reasonable in my relation to the day to day activities of life. Certainly not always, but way more than I used to be before I started on this path.

If I lined up all the Buddhist practitioners in the world and asked them to write a two hundred word description of meditation, no two would be alike. Neither description, nor practitioner. Buddhism allows wide latitude in how we go about gathering our faith together, not as a belief system but rather a system of core behavioral advice that will over time change how we are. Buddhism is a process, not an event.

Currently with the world situation being what it is, we think we are experiencing something new or novel, well we are, but most of the world has been in greater discomfort for many centuries than we have ever been. In my lifetime in U.S., we have lived at the height of Empire while 80 % of world was used by our educational system as proof we are special and that others need to be exploited so that we can grow stronger, and then help them. If we don’t stampede we have tremendous opportunities facing us

Here we are. Life is and always will be uncertain, if not now, later for sure.

So, here we are.

Our current big choice is how we look at the discomforts we are experiencing? I choose to see them as a teaching for my own good, whether I live or die, everything in my life is always being presented to me as a teaching for my own good and consequently for the good of all beings. I can choose to look past the end of my nose and look up, rather than down.

How can I help? What can I do? Please allow me to see and act clearly, and if unclear to refrain from acting ’til I know what is good to do! That is today’s prayer and deep wish.

 

Today is a beautiful Spring day, its not always

Rainy and dark when the Mongol Horde, or the

Einsatzgruppen, or British East India Co., or

“Go West young man” starts, or Bubonic

Plagues and Chinese famines and Vietnamese

Invasions commence or 9/11 just happens.

It’s never just one cause for anything, rather a

Chain of causation that stretches way back

Beyond the thought of man. Here we all are.

Yes, we can, we can change and accept and

Lean into the Sunset and welcome Sunrises.

After we ask, can we stay still long enough 

To hear the answer and then, see what is

Really needed,         for the benefit of all?