In the morning as the storm begins to blow away

the clear sky appears for a moment and it seems to me

that there has been something simpler

than I could ever believe

simpler than I could have begun to find words for

not patient not even waiting no more hidden

than the air itself that became part of me for a while

with every breath and remained with me unnoticed

something that was here unnamed unknown in the days

and the nights not separate from them

not separate from them as they came and were gone

it must have been here neither early nor late then

by what name can I address it now holding out my thanks

M. S. Merwin

there is a veil or a haze or an indefinable cloud between us and our knowing……where can we shed some weight? where is lightness found? with the balance of dark? like riding the ferris wheel when we were kids……

At the core of the Middle Way, we find ‘pratiyasamutpada,’ or ‘dependent arising.’ Can you find anything- either in the realm of consciousness or of matter- that does not come into existence, express itself and fall away contingent upon other elements? The teachings of dependent arising have deep implications. Since everything arises in dependence upon other factors, we can’t identify where one thing ends and another begins. We can’t find the edges of anything, and we begin to see that the world resists definition. As much as we attempt to reach definitive conclusions about our selves, others, and our world, life continuously bursts from the seams of our beliefs and ideas. Because all things rely upon the ever-shifting nature of other elements, they will always remain uncapturable, beyond our ability to fathom them. The Middle Way helps us to understand who we are in relationship to our world……..Elizabeth Mattis Namgyel

consider the abyss

The seat of the soul is where the inner world

and the outer world meet.

Where they overlap,

it is in every point of the overlap.

….Novalis