No matter what we may think, no matter how we appear, we always have agency. If we appear passive, we have chosen that. And we chose passivity for a reason: we believe that it is a viable strategy. Passive Active No responsibility Burdened with responsibility Many years ago, I knew someone who was an abuser. And when he was called …
Thanksgiving….
Two years ago, just before Thanksgiving, my mother spoke her final word: “No!” After that, her body relaxed, and the nurse thought she was resting. Actually, her body had ceased to be alive. When we first saw her body over twenty-four hours later, it looked as if she were resting. Her skin had color and was still supple. The only …
Knowing What We Bring to the Table….
If we are going to undertake spiritual practice, then we have to know what we bring to the table. Until we are clear about our own systems, we can only go so far in sadhana. We are required to know what we bring to the table and discern how appropriate it is at any moment. An important element that people …
Humoring Our Humorlessness….
Humor is so necessary for spiritual practice. In order to have humor—genuine humor, not caustic wit—we have to be disentangled. We have to be able to laugh at ourselves, not just in a superficial way but from the depths of our being. When we have no sense of humor, we demonstrate that we are attached to and identified with the …
Love Is Not Pain….
Love is the bottom line of life. But we are capable of twisting Love into pain. Why do we do this? We do it through ignorance of what Love really is. In order to get to pain, we have to twist Love so much. Love grounds and encompasses everything; pain is so paltry in comparison. Love is Self-illuminating; pain cannot …
Lessons from My Mother….
I could have learned to be just like my mother. Though as a child I did not want to be like her, we unconsciously pick up the qualities of our first caregivers and live them out even in our repulsions—and our repulsions can bind us even more than our attractions. If not for Baba I may have ended up as …