The Five Invitations: Discovering What Death Can Teach Us About Living Fully
updated 8d ago
updated 8d ago
Attachment likes to impersonate love. It says, “I will love you if you give me what I need.” Love is focused on generosity; attachment is obsessed with getting needs met. Love is an expression of our most essential nature; attachment is an expression of the personality. Love engenders faithfulness, aligning with our values, moving with purpose; att
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Loving and letting go are inseparable. You can’t love and cling at the same time. Too often we mistake attachment for love. In Buddhism, loving kindness, or metta, is considered a sublime state of being. A heavenly realm. It’s expansive, allowing, caring, and connective. Attachment masquerades as love. It
Walter Briggs added 3mo ago
Earth dissolves into water. Water dissolves into fire. Fire dissolves into air. Air dissolves into space. Space dissolves into consciousness.
Walter Briggs added 3mo ago
It’s confusing to be around people who are confused. Their apparent irrationality and the absence of customary social patterns disturb us. We expect people to make sense. We are so strongly identified with our rational-thinking minds that the idea of losing control is frightening to most of us.
Walter Briggs added 3mo ago
Ram Dass once said, “After many years of undergoing psychoanalysis, teaching psychology, working as a psychotherapist, taking drugs, being in India, being a yogi, having a guru, and meditating for decades, as far as I can see I haven’t gotten rid of one neurosis. Not one. The only thing that changed is that they don’t define me anymore.
Walter Briggs added 3mo ago
SONO’S DEATH POEM Don’t just stand there with your hair turning gray, soon enough the seas will sink your little island. So while there is still the illusion of time, set out for another shore. No sense packing a bag. You won’t be able to lift it into your boat. Give away all your collections. Take only new seeds and an old stick. Send out some pra
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Wisdom tells me I am nothing. Love tells me I am everything. Between the two, my life flows. —NISARGADATTA MAHARAJ
Walter Briggs added 3mo ago
The gift of impermanence is that it places us squarely in the here and now. We know that birth will end in death. Reflecting on this might cause us to savor the moment, to imbue our lives with more appreciation and gratitude. We know that the end of all accumulation is dispersion. Reflecting on this might help us to practice simplicity and discover
... See moreWalter Briggs added 3mo ago
Pain + Resistance = Suffering If we attempt to push away our pain, whether it is physical or emotional, we almost always find ourselves suffering even more. When we open to suffering, inquiring into it instead of trying to deny it, we see how we might make use of it in our lives.
Walter Briggs added 3mo ago