May love, peace and joy flow through you, to all who touch your world.

I wanted to break my latest hiatus by letting you know I’ve been thinking of you. I know I haven’t reached that many people with my words in the grand scheme of things. That said, I do believe that those whom I have touched have in turn touched the lives of others, just as I continue to share the gifts of insight and love that others have given me. We are sharing the human experience, and we can’t stop our influence from spreading beyond our reach.

It is my sincerest goal that my life bring more love, more peace, and more joy to the lives of those around me than I would have thought possible. And that, through enjoying those blessings we share, those lives then shine their light forward to illuminate the dark spaces of others. In this way, the light and love that I have received with may continue that work throughout our world.

Please, take a moment to remember something that is special to you, that warms your heart. Remember a thought, an experience, a talent or a dream that helps you feel your spark inside. Take three deep, slow breaths, savoring this moment of precious peace. Feel the sacred beauty of nature, and of the human heart, savoring that precious unity-point where the outside world touches your skin. Remember we are one people, sharing one planet, and enjoy a moment of gratitude for the opportunity to be a part of it.

Take another moment, please, to experience the positive, warm peace that dwells within the stillness. Form a memory of what that feels like. And from now on, whenever possible, call up that moment of peace to your conscious attention, to help you through a hectic time, or even to periodically brighten your day.

As you practice this, you can’t help but create a positive influence for the world you inhabit. May that warm embrace of the joyful stillness come easier and easier for you, until it shapes your every day.

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How do we know we can’t know what it’s like to be living inside a different skin?

While I’m thinking about identity, I wanted to share a Zen anecdote I rediscovered recently.

Fishy Zen

While Chuang-Tzu was walking along a river with a friend, he noticed the fish were swimming about in the clear water. After watching them a few moments, he remarked, “Those fish are having such fun, enjoying themselves in the water!”

His friend scoffed, “You are not a fish, you couldn’t possibly know whether they’re enjoying themselves.”

Chuang-Tzu shrugged back at his companion. “You are not me. How do you know I can’t know they’re enjoying themselves?”

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I’m not that, I’m this. But what if this changes?

After conversations I’ve had over the last week or so, I can’t stop thinking about the idea of Identity. That is, our sense of who we are based on those ideas, things or people we associate with… as well as those we reject.

It’s not that we tend to sit down to take a conscious inventory of how we define ourselves. Rather, our self-definitions assert themselves when they find an opportunity to prove their truth, or when they feel threatened. Even if we start to drift in what we believe (or want to believe), our definitions can be such engrained habits that they tangle us up into old patterns. This gets even trickier when our definitions conflict.

For an example, let’s walk through the thoughts and emotions I just experienced.

I write because I tend to identify as someone who can communicate deeper meanings in an accessible way. I hesitate to write because I also identify as so quirky I risk being cryptic and inaccessible. So when I tried to think of how to illustrate this identity thing, I sort of froze up. I knew I should be able to do it, but I doubted that I could, in the time I’ve given myself. My definitions were in conflict. Because of these conflicts, I can over-emphasize or overlook times when I am and am not as clear as I’d hoped.

I then figured that I could put this off until tomorrow, when I felt better prepared. I identify as accomplishing what I set out for, but also as getting so bogged down and distracted I never make the time to post. I doubted that I’d make it back tomorrow, prepared and posting. I’ll overlook when I do keep on task with things, and I’ll overemphasize to myself the times I slip off the track.

That’s when I realized I was doing it again. I’m becoming more aware of these ways my definitions work together and at odds, nudging or shoving me through random moments throughout the day. So I figured I had a decent way to explain my line of thought, here.

Perhaps tomorrow I’ll think of more to share, and find a good way to share it. I’m curious to discover my actual traits of communication and stick-to-it-iveness, prepared to revise my self-definitions accordingly.

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This is all there is. So what of it?

I was trying to think of a truth that is very difficult to embrace.

What came to me is, “This is all there is.”

I started to think about how that can be a fear, accepting that this present moment is all we really have.  The feeling that accepting this means settling for less than we would want things to be in the future, as opposed to merely dropping our resistance to observing what’s in our present.

I also thought about the idea of what we see, hear, feel, and so on may be the sum total of existence. That is, the perception that there’s nothing beyond these senses of any substance or meaning. And objectively speaking, that possibility really needs to be considered and brought to heart. If we’re forced to stop and accept that our physical life holds such weight, it places a huge responsibility on us to make the most of it. We can’t shrug off that responsibility figuring that there’s better things later we just have to hold out for. There’s a real value to that.

I then realized a third and even more difficult way to embrace that truth. Who, what and where we are: it’s all interconnected. Time, space, the resonance of matter that forms the particles we are now experiencing as our breathing lungs and beating hearts… there’s no hard barrier once you start to follow the threads. On the vast continuum of Indra’s Net, we are holding the space of just one of those dewdrops, reflecting every other bejeweled node on the net.

In this moment, we hold a connection to every other moment.

In this space, we resonate echos of every other space.

In this experience, we enjoy a reflection of all there is.

Those can be easy things to throw out there as words and concepts, but harder to make “feel real” to our own psyche. And if we do let it “feel real”, what does that mean? What potentials are there for us in the here and now? What responsibility do we have to discover and use them?

If this is all there is, what are we obliged to make of it?

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Try consciously choosing joy in various moments, and see what enjoyment that brings.

Since I’ve been practicing it as promised, I want to explain just a little by what I envision by “Have no more conflicts. Enjoy a positive association with everything.“

For me, this phrase is a succinct reminder to maintain some measure of calm acceptance, finding a touchstone of positivity in each moment. Since the everyday frustrations seem to keep evolving over time, it helps for my strategies to evolve, too.

By having no conflicts, I mean, don’t get wound up about a situation being different than I might otherwise hope. Where there’s a disagreement or such with an individual, I’m trying to remember to address the actual issue rather than treating the person involved with it as a problem. Yes, I may perceive them as being the one who “started” the problem, but dwelling on that only interferes with finding a solution. Generally they’re caught up in their own maelstrom of frustrations, and having a little patience with that can help clear some of the storm for both of us.

And that’s where enjoying a positive association comes in. If an otherwise negative situation involves someone I like or love, I remember to focus on that while resolving (or accepting) the situation. If it’s a stranger, I remember to focus on the fact they are a human being, and I happen to like human beings.

If it doesn’t involve another person at all, there’s generally something about my situation or environment that I can focus on with a sense of appreciation, or even just humor. Anything that can help me enjoy that sense of positive resonance that we feel when we’re in the presence of something we welcome into our lives.

I hope that helps explain a little about how I’ve been practicing this, perhaps giving ideas as to how you might enhance your enjoyment of your own life. If so, please give it a shot! Just a little bit of trying out a new habit can make a world of difference in how we experience our world.

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Have no more conflicts. Enjoy a positive association with everything.

Today, I received a very good piece of advice. Even taken out of context, it sums up roughly to:

Have no more conflicts. Enjoy a positive association with everything.

Actually, both within and without the original context, I can’t think of a better way to put it. This is what I’m going to be working on over the next few days.

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After the bleakest, bitter cold, the world gives us glorious new life. Happens every year. Feel this in your bones.

Dry and barren ground
Sprouting the fig tree’s first leaf
Miracle of Spring

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It’s funny how the most meaningful moments in life are found within the most day-to-day, if we pause to notice them.

It’s time to give a bit of a status update for my Lent resolution of giving up “Separation”, or the idea that the experiences I have of other people can be completely “separate” from my own life as a human being.

Today, there was a bit of a traffic snarl in trying to leave work. I had to take a detour, and on the way home, there were more “snarls”, which reminded me what an obstructed time it was in the morning to start with. It was just a day of jams and being in each others’ way. Inevitably, there were drivers who were trying to weave in, jut out, and otherwise “beat” the traffic game, as though it were a competition.

I had a curious experience in all of this. Moreso than normal, I had a deep appreciation for the frustration these dangerous drivers were feeling that “drove” them to drive so unsafely. I felt myself wishing them all the best, and lending my lovingkindness to prevent them from experiencing any accidents or injuries as a result of the difficult time they were having. I recognized that we are all sharing one road, and the accident that impacts one/two vehicles, impacts us all.

I realize it can be considered a fairly “mundane” epiphany, but then again, my focus is squarely on the everyday experiences we have as regular human beings. One of the most everyday of the everyday is the dangerous tedium of the commute, and it was in this everyday experience I felt a unity with the others sharing my road.

I figure, you might have some relative idea of what this might mean to your own life, so I wanted to share. Truly, all my best to you, for we are sharing one road, and I wish for it to be smooth for us all.

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Living for tomorrow prevents us from living the life we’re presently in.

I’m getting ready to turn in, and I find myself struggling against the “Sunday night blues”. You know, that resistance to the weekend being over, knowing the next morning starts the workweek again?

Yes, I’ve had a great weekend, and no I don’t feel like getting up in the morning to go to work. But I didn’t feel like getting up this morning, either. I was able to sleep in a tiny bit, but it was when my son gets up and needed to be taken care of. I love spending time with my son, and adored having the morning together. If I don’t resent having to wake up before I feel like it on Sunday, how does it help to resent it Monday?

And really, how does it help to resent any present moment one finds oneself in? I’m generally pretty good about enjoying each day as best I can rather than “living for the weekend”, so I’m surprised at how much I’d rather have another Sunday tomorrow.

Regardless, Sunday or Monday, I’ll need to get up before I feel like it. So I may as well go relax into restfulness and have some sweet dreams.

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When living-in-the-moment becomes just another habit, I think I’ll be pretty content.

There were a few times today that I paused to bring my focus back to the just-as-it-is-ness of the moment I was in at the time.  Today, it’s not so much that there’s any one particular observation that’s all that noteworthy. Instead, I suppose what’s noteworthy is how very mundane it all is, once we get into the habit.

I mean, once we get into the habit of trying to take the present moment just as it is, being in-the-moment becomes very mundane. I sort of think that’s the point. After enlightenment, the laundry, eh?

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