A fresh attitude starts to happen when we look to see that yesterday was yesterday, and now it is gone; today is today and now it is new. It is like that – every hour, every minute is changing. If we stop observing change, then we stop seeing everything as new. ~ Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche
The Buddah taught that there are three principal characteristics of human existence: impermanance, egolessness, and suffering or dissatisfaction. According to the Buddah, the lives of all beings are marked by these qualities. Recognizing these qualities to be real and true in our own experience helps us to relax with things as they are.
When I first heard this teaching it seemed academic and remote. But when I was encouraged to pay attention – to be curious about what was happening with my body and my mind – something shifted. I could observe from my own experience that nothing is static. My moods are continuously shifting like the weather. I am definitely not in control of what thoughts or emotions are going to arise, nor can I halt their flow. Stillness is followed by movement, movement flows back into stillness. Even the most persistent physical pain, when I pay attention to it, changes like the tides.
I feel gratitude to the Buddah for pointing out that what we struggle against all our lives can be acknowledged as ordinary experience. Life does continually go up and down. People and situations are unpredictable and so is everything else. Everybody knows the pain of getting what we don’t want: saints, sinners, winners, losers. I feel gratitude that someone saw the truth and pointed out that we don’t suffer this kind of pain because of our personal inability to get things right.
Pema Chodron
The Places that Scare You
"I feel gratitude that someone saw the truth and pointed out that we don't suffer this kind of pain because of our personal inability to get things right." Thank you Alexa. People need to hear this, especially with the new age myth that we somehow cause our own pain and difficult circumstances regardless, as promulgated in books like The Secret.
In reaction to a lot of posts about the Law of Attraction, I once posted a couple of intents: Do female rape victims use the Law of Attraction to attract their rapists? And do victims of pedophiles who are raped and killed attract their predators? No one answered to contest these questions. These are extreme examples, of course.
I feel that sometimes, shit happens. I had cancer years ago. Did I attract it? Some books say 'yes.' I think it's more likely that the time I spent working in a pharmaceutical company, inhaling dangerous chemicals, had something to do with it. To think otherwise engenders a great deal of guilt, one of the most toxic emotions. And guilt gets in the way of healing.
Well said. Sometimes I wish that more people paid attention to basic facts – that colds are caused by virii for example, not by 'not thinking positively enough.'
The clock ticks one second at a time as in moment to moment but it is still connected to the Source of its tick and to be that Source one will see how the "Wheel" truly does work as the effects are only brought in subjectively and never reached objectively once mastered..enjoy sitting patiently and awaiting the next round of patience to show up once again…
Dom*
buddhist wisdom…thank you for this article and excellent comments that break the myths open… beachgirl
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I agree about the loa. We are human and we go through human experiences. So do the masters. Their bodies get sick, they also face accidents, home fires and other human challenges in life. What is more telling is how we choose to go through them. and to keep our humanity and faith. thanks guys.