K and I are just back from a quick trip to MI. Ok, so we were back on Sunday night. But today, Christmas day, is the first moment I've had not riddled with exhaustion since I finally managed to get back here with the car and the luggage from that 48 hour nightmare flying across the US in a winter storm. In the Christmas spirit, which has not come easily to me in a few years (Eid anyone?), here is a little meditation.
The degree of love we manifest determines the degree of spaciousness and freedom we can bring to life's events.
Imagine taking a very small glass or water and putting into it a teaspoon of salt. Because of the small size of the container, the teaspoon of salt is going to have a big effect on the water. However, if you approach a much larger body of water, such as a lake, and put into it the same teaspoonful of salt, it will not have the same intensity of impact, because of the vastness and openness of the vessel receiving it. Even when the salt remains the same, the spaciousness of the vessel receiving it changes everything.
We spend a lot of our lives looking for a feeling of safety or protection--we try to alter the amount of salt that comes our way. Ironically, the salt is the very thing that we cannot do anything about, as life changes and offers us repeated ups and downs. Our true work is to create a container so immense that any amount of salt, even a truckload, can come into it without affecting our capacity to receive it.
-- Sharon Salzberg, Lovingkindness
Imagine taking a very small glass or water and putting into it a teaspoon of salt. Because of the small size of the container, the teaspoon of salt is going to have a big effect on the water. However, if you approach a much larger body of water, such as a lake, and put into it the same teaspoonful of salt, it will not have the same intensity of impact, because of the vastness and openness of the vessel receiving it. Even when the salt remains the same, the spaciousness of the vessel receiving it changes everything.
We spend a lot of our lives looking for a feeling of safety or protection--we try to alter the amount of salt that comes our way. Ironically, the salt is the very thing that we cannot do anything about, as life changes and offers us repeated ups and downs. Our true work is to create a container so immense that any amount of salt, even a truckload, can come into it without affecting our capacity to receive it.
-- Sharon Salzberg, Lovingkindness
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