Lifeletter #188: The Fires of Slowness
Don’t accept the modern myths of aging. You are not declining. You are not fading away into uselessness. You are a sage, a river at its deepest and most nourishing. Sit by a river bank some time and watch attentively as the river tells you of your life. – Lao Tzu I posted these words of Lao Tzu’s on Facebook last week. The only ones that showed, unless you scrolled further down the page, were “Don’t accept the modern myths of aging. You are not declining.”...
Read MoreLifeletter #187: I Dare You
A beautiful photo of an indigenous elder caught my eye in the airport yesterday. He was strong, clean, radiant. Jonathan and I talked about it, as he waited for his plane. “What is it that pours out of him, that we don’t often see, in our elders?” I asked. In a moment I answered my own question: “It’s silence.” “…He’s so still, so quiet inside-you can feel it, just seeing his face. That’s the true task of our elders: they are the guardians of our...
Read MoreLifeletter #186: The Asana of Rejection
A teacher of mine, Thomas Huebl, came up with this beautiful image: learning to be fully human requires that we practice the asana of rejection. The minute I heard the words, I knew this was my next assignment from the universe: to practice the asana, the yoga pose, of rejection, and find a way to enjoy it. To stop designing my life so that I can avoid the experience of being rejected, and to become deeply interested in it instead. It sounded impossible to me, and that’s how I knew it was...
Read MoreLifeletter #185: A Cosmic Interruption
It’s one of life’s paradoxes, or jokes on us, that intense spiritual practice, which is aimed at dissolving our solid, separate sense of self, can often do the opposite. Our years of passionate and devoted practice can build up a powerful, hidden egoic identity. We might not notice this when things are going more or less our way. But when they don’t, when chaos and confusion and grief and heartbreak knock on our door, we can find it very difficult to maintain our spacious,...
Read MoreLifeletter #184: The Invisible Smile
The shingles virus has been visiting me, on and off, for the last year. When it is active, it inflames the nerves in the right side of my mouth and jaw, and makes it very painful to smile. It’s been strange, interacting with people, and not being able to smile. During a recent skype session with a friend, she said, “Oh, I miss your smile!” I told her that I was missing it too. After that conversation, I had a moment in which I realized that I didn’t want to live without...
Read MoreLifeletter #183: Praise Often
Awake, my dear. Be kind to your sleeping heart. Take it out into the vast fields of Light And let it breathe. -Hafiz I worked recently with a Zen teacher named Diane Musho Hamilton. One of the guidelines she asked us to follow in our group process was ‘Praise Often.‘ The more I practice this, the more I learn about praise and the unfathomable nature of the heart. Praise is not flattery, praise is not casual. Real praise is precise, and it comes from the fact that I see you, I...
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