Reading Archives (2024)
Addiction
Jac O'Keeffe
It seems that a believed thought (most often unconscious) underpinning addictions goes like this: ‘something outside of me can make me feel complete/happy or whole’. Experiencing extern...
Inhabiting The Body
Judith Blackstone
To live within the body is to be in contact with the internal space of the body. To inhabit our hands, for example, means that we are in contact with the whole internal space of our hands. To be in co...
What Is Mu?
Robert G. Harwood
“What is mu?” By contemplating such zen koans, students sometimes have deep existential insights, and it was this question that I now asked myself. In the past, I had no idea what an appro...
I No Longer Pray
Chelan Harkin
I no longer pray— now I drink dark chocolate and let the moon sing to me. I no longer pray— I let my ancestors dance through my hips at the slightest provocation....
Our Early Experiences
Dr. Gabor Maté
My mother had muscular dystrophy, which is a degenerative disease of the muscles. It’s hereditary, runs in our family. And so, she could no longer walk, get out of bed, even feed herself very we...
Yodeling Above Freedom
David Bullon
There is a thrushing light alive - dancing and whirling; concealed by midlife shadows in my antsy eyes. My snow-shining mountainous essence beams luminously through that shade, but somehow its rest...
We Are Contextual Beings
Pir Aga Mir
Here is one of my central inquiries: If our spiritual and religious practices are not expanding our circle of empathy, compassion, love and care, what is their purpose? If they are not preparing us fo...
In Hardship, Choose Bewilderment Over Cleverness
Toko-Pa Turner
In grappling with degenerative autoimmune disease, I often wished for a speedy redemption, for something meaningful to come out of my pain and suffering. But every time I tried, I’d be humbled b...
The Great Divide
Mark Vandeneijnde
The great divide: On the left there is business It loves to think and problem solve Move fast and talk with resolve Perform so hard it wears you down If only it would stop to breathe and look a...
The Eagle And The Chicken
Jamie Glenn
A fable is told about an eagle that thought he was a chicken. When the eagle was very small, he fell from the safety of his nest. A chicken farmer found the eagle, brought him to the farm, and raised ...
Sacred Vs. Survival Language
Vyaas Houston
Avidya is the defining of a self which is not the self; with happiness in what is actually suffering; with purity in what is really impurity; and permanence in what is really impermanent. Avidya pe...
The False Self From Childhood
Eric Jones
I ran across a developmental psychology theory not long ago that I’ve had bouncing around in the back of my head ever since. It comes from the pediatrician and psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott, wh...
Listening Is A Great Art
J. Krishnamurti
You know, listening is a great art. It is one of the great arts we have not cultivated: to listen completely to another. When you listen so completely to another, as I hope you are doing it now, you a...
Sacred Mess Of Nature
Lucy Grace
A seed eventually blooms into the most beautiful flower. But first it must break down, crack open, travel through mud without any guarantees and give over to instinct and the will of existence. It doe...
Genjo Koan
Dogen Zenji
Enlightenment is like the moon reflected in the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken. Although its light is wide and great, the moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch wid...
Is There A Real World Out There?
Anil Seth
Here’s a commonsense view of perception. Let’s call it the “how things seem” view. There’s a mind‑independent reality out there, full of objects and people and place...
What Is Prayer?
Rupert Spira
And what is prayer? Again, I would like to remain silent, for silence is the closest we come to God before losing ourself in that. Prayer is simply to remain as the ‘I am’ before the words...
A Jeweler's Eye
Suleika Jaouad
Of my diagnosis, he had asked, “If you could take it all back, would you?” The answer I arrived at was this: “The tangling of so much cruelty and beauty has made of my life a stra...
Suffering Is Never Alone But Shared
Richard Flyer
I feel and see the flow of life and death inside and outside me. Sometimes, I resist in despair, saying — why should this be, all the senseless misery? Tears are unleashed. Torrents of liquid...
From Me To We: True Love Is A Process Of Humility
Thich Nhat Hanh
A community of people walking together on a spiritual path has a great deal of strength; its members are able to protect each other, to help each other in every aspect of the practice, and to build th...