shadowed strength
The greatest lesson I have learned is that the universal must be wedded to our immediate personal circumstances to be fulfilled in spiritual life. The human gate to the sacred is our own body, heart, & mind, our history & the closest relationships & circumstances of our life. If not here, where else could we bring alive compassion, justice, & liberation? This personal approach honors the timeless & mysterious dance of birth & death, our body, or family & community, & the history & joys & sorrows that have been given to us. In this way, our awakening is a very personal matter that also affects all other creatures on earth…..Jack Kornfield
love being you….love the flaws, the failures, the things that will never get done…the irony is here in the freedom to step forward when we let go of our stuck places…the alarming fears become shallow ground…the roots of the fixed, hard ego find moss…
Wouldn’t it be sweet to come home & find the Buddha there, simply & utterly at peace, desireless with a hearty warmth & genuine nobility of spirit? Wouldn’t it be satisfying to be like that, to be in touch with your own authentic being? That’s why an Indian master when asked what advice he had for Westerners seeking enlightenment, said, ‘Stay where your are.’ Be wherever you are; be whoever you are. When you genuinely become you, a Buddha realizes Buddhahood. You become a Buddha by actualizing your own original innate nature. This nature is primordially pure. This innate Buddha-nature doesn’t need to achieve enlightenment because it is always already perfect, from the beginningless beginning…….Lama Surya Das
Make Believe Boutique 
IB, great post…if we can’t find our truth where we are, then how can we believe we will find it elsewhere? 😀 x
So smart, sassy & cogent! I wish we could all make sense of our deeper truth…….thanks for the inspiration Jane….Blessings…
Jane has said it so well, we are reminded that we need to be in the world and not of the world, through consciousness we should be able to see nature working through us, yet find our way free …
This reminds me of how contemplative practices are much more relevant when practiced through our everyday experience….freedom is seeing for sure…..already perfect…..thanks g.f.s….
Excellent! I think it is so important that spirituality is relevant to who and where we are, otherwise it so easily becomes escapism.
My great fear is the loss of authenticity…that sneaky feeling that ‘I’m getting somewhere’ is really not about the journey…it’s about ego…..yes, may we be ourselves, regardless…..thanks….may your beginnings be sweet….