If we can keep at least a bit of the mind clear about temporality, we can mange complicated, even difficult, times with grace.
Interpretation
Being aware of the temporary nature of situations helps us navigate challenges gracefully.
This quote emphasizes the importance of understanding that difficult times are transient. By maintaining a clear awareness of temporality, we can face life's challenges with composure and grace, enabling us to better manage stress and adversity.
In practice
In a motivational speech about overcoming challenges.
Heir to your own karma doesn't mean 'You get what you deserve.' I think it means 'You get what you get.' Bad things happen to good people. My happiness depending on my action means, to me, that it depends on my action of choosing compassion--for myself as well as for everyone else--rather than contention. [p.61]
If you take a deep breath and look around, 'Look what's happening to me!' can become 'Look what's happening!' And what's happening? The incredible drama of life is happening. And we're in it!
Mindfulness is the aware, balanced acceptance of the present experience. It isn't more complicated that that. It is opening to or recieving the present moment, pleasant or unpleasant, just as it is, without either clinging to it or rejecting it.
The path of compassion leads to the development of insight. But it doesn't work to say, "Ready, set, go! Be compassionate!" Beginning any practice depends on intention. Intention depends on intuiting-at least a little bit-the suffering inherent in the human condition and the pain we feel, and cause, when we act out of confusion. It also depends on trusting-at least a little bit-in the possibility of a contented, satisfied mind.
Mindfulness is attentiveness, moment to moment. What's happening right now and what's coming up in me in response to what's happening right now. Importantly, this is in the service of being able to choose wisely so that I avoid complicating my own life and the lives of others.
Suffering is the demand that experience be different from what it is.
The cut worm forgives the plow.
As long as anything in this world means anything to you, your freedom is only a word. You are like a bird that is held by a leash; you can only fly so far.
He who would be serene and pure needs but one thing, detachment.
The right thing to do never requires any subterfuge, it is always simple and direct.
There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow men. True nobility lies in being superior to your former self.
Thought is the blossom; language the bud; action the fruit behind it.
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