Anyway, another quote from TNH that is really worth pondering:
Life is impermanent, but that does not mean that it is not worth living. It is precisely because of its impermanence that we value life so dearly. Therefore we must know how to live each moment deeply and use it in a responsible way. If we are able to live the present moment completely, we will not feel regret later. We will know how to care for those who are close to us and how to bring them happiness. When we accept that all things are impermanent, we will not be incapacitated by suffering when things decay and die. We can remain peaceful and content in the face of continuity and change, prosperity and decline, success and failure.
These words are of course, not only about the present moment but also about the reality of life and death. We are - most of us at least - afraid of death and spend a good deal of time avoiding the reality of it in ourselves: our aging, our growing aches and pains, our increasing frailty and vulnerability.
As a Christian I have always found the words in the Letter to the Hebrews in the bible so very supportive and hopeful. The writer is trying to say something about what Jesus by his life and death offers us. So, the writer suggests that Jesus came to help 'free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death'. Those seem perhaps, like strong words but just looking around our society at its stress on youth, on health, on protecting ourselves from suffering - maybe there is fear of death there, especially in our fear of suffering. Maybe we miss the present moment because we are worried and distracted and fearful of many things...
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| Children are pretty good at being in the present moment . |
*Thich Nhat Hanh: Your True Home, The everyday wisdom of TNH, Shambhala, Boston and London, 2011.
1 comment:
Impermanence is not only about losing life and people and things we value, it is also an opportunity for growth. If we were doomed to stay exactly as we were, then we wouldn't be able to learn how to appreciate our present moments more.
Also, another way to think about suffering and fear of death is that without suffering we wouldn't have compassion. From our own suffering, we can learn to be compassionate towards ourselves and all the other beings (human or not) who suffer and fear death. We shouldn't expect to live in a perfect permanent world, because then there wouldn't be compassion and so it wouldn't be perfect. But from developing compassion, we can heal ourselves and others. As TNH says, pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional.
That is an adorable picture of the little boy.
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