AC failed on Tuesday
It is really too bad that I am not enlightened. Or a good Buddhist. Or a warrior trained by a desert shaman. To be real: it’s too bad I’m not even endowed with a moderately level temper. This week has been intense. (Wasn’t last week too? And, will the coming week be any less so?)
downsizing in NY Sat, Sun, Mon
Annuals putting out
washing machine failed on Tues
newly dubbed “Hitler Weed” trying to take over
The recent demands of family, the nearly incapacitating heat, and the thought of getting ready for a five day trip without a washing machine would make even a better person cranky. OK. Let me just state that. Nevertheless, I can’t help but repeatedly ask myself, what is this need to place value on things? To continually make the assignment: “bad” or “good”? How much more energy might I have if every single thing crossing my doorstep simply “was”? (Think: Byron Katie).
Ah… lemon, mint, honey, ice and herbs!!
THAT’s where the edge is for me these days. As I roll that question around in my hot, sometimes cranky, being, I will drink lots of iced tea flavored with fresh mint!
i like this question. a lot. a reminder that everything simply “is.” and becomes something “else” only when we define it otherwise. and i’m asking myself, why do i do that–when things simply “are?”
Where are the Shaman when we need them? (inside, deep inside) Or those stupid quotes “this too shall pass… ” Ha, those words never help me at such junctures. Crankiness reigns and helps me more – and others less (LOL). At such times I do not even have the presence of mind to wish for the shaman intervention… it is definitely too sweaty, in this weather (new word: “sweather”? a sister word to “swelter”?), for the proverbial hug – “ah! don’t touch me!” The mere thought of touching furniture, dirty laundry, BLECH… and so, I admire thee, Dee. I hope you get a break soon! A dip in cool clear Walden Pond???
Patricia – one of the tricks, for me, in asking the question is to not turn it into (yet another) exercise of failed self-acceptance. One quick summation that works a lot? And is cliche but still works? “I’m human”.
You make me laugh Maggie, for managing to capture what is so, so trying about the heat and foul moods, while also making the deeper point about all the guidance we need living inside. Bravo to that idea! One simple benefit to really internalizing that notion — the cost savings to booksellers because no need to keep buying books by experts or spiritual beings ‘better than’! (just kidding. sort of)
sending some cooling mid winter air through the ether from here in the Land Down Under!
thank you, Mo! and I am sending you some of the long lasting sunshine!
Patricia (I wish I could ‘reply’ right under your comment, but haven’t figured that out on wordpress…. ). And there it is, wishing for something else. I am reminded of a poem by David Whyte, called “The Well of Grief”:
Those who will not slip beneath
the still surface on the well of grief
turning downward through its black water
to the place we cannot breathe
will never know the source from which we drink,
the secret water, cold and clear,
nor find in the darkness glimmering
the small round coins
thrown by those who wished for something else.
Dee, if you dig into the depths of your WP settings, there’s one for reply nesting. I suspect yours is set to zero or something.
But back to the post at hand … it made me laugh out loud 🙂 And reminded me of a former manager who told me about someone she knew who’d spent quite a bit of time in an ashram in India, but was no good at all in real life. It’s no joke when the washing machine breaks, that’s for sure. All I can say is I’m a heck of a lot more patient than I used to be, and that’s progress 🙂
thank you so much for the WP tip! look at me, replying right under your comment!
Most impressive, and you’re welcome 🙂 There’s a whole labyrinth of settings under there …
Not completely sure of the spiritual benefits of picking up after dogs, I’ve always thought of it as what had to be done … but if benefits there are, I have experienced them just in the past few minutes 😀
Hi Heather. Thank you for the ashram story. I went to a yoga retreat once for two days and mentioned to the teacher that I felt too busy picking up dog shit, taking children to the orthodontist and doing laundry to pursue spiritual matters, and he exclaimed, “I’m GLAD you’re picking up dog shit! That’s perfect!” (easy for him to say?! all that Sanskrit committed to memory?) But I took his point.
and thank you so much for the WP tip.
Wish you a better week …. 😉
oh thank you… it really has been good. all good. even as I shake my head about another mini-calamity!