“Knee-deep in the cosmic overwhelm, I’m stricken by the ricochet wonder of it all: the plain everythingness of everything, in cahoots with the everythingness of everything else.”
from ‘Diffraction’ by Carl Sagan
Picture is mine taken on a walk at Kinlochleven , Scotland last week. I am going to be seeing more of this view!
“Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.” Camus
We are all one, and paradoxically we all are individual. Isn’t this life a constant wonder? To understand our seperateness is to have a level of self awareness that can challenge and reward. It challenges our sense of belonging and our feelings of being loved entirely, and rewards by its observation of each person’s individual choice to take their own decisions and be responsible for their own moral choices. I lloved Kahlil Gibran’s take on having children – that they are arrows from the parents bows – they go on to be fully developed , seperate beings.
My hardest times are when my loved ones do not seem to acknowledge me – they are disinterested in some way in my feelings. That is the challenge of understanding our seperateness – their love is no less, but it is a fluid river on which I sail. It is not my boat. And sometimes it is a stormy ride. I look forward to those passages when the river is calm, and the view is tranquil.
Enjoy your week my friends. 
Equanimity is a perfect, unshakable balance of mind, rooted in insight.
Says the Master:
For one who clings, motion exists; but for one who clings not, there is no motion. Where no motion is, there is stillness. Where stillness is, there is no craving. Where no craving is, there is neither coming nor going. Where no coming nor going is, there is neither arising nor passing away. Where neither arising nor passing away is, there is neither this world nor a world beyond, nor a state between. This, verily, is the end of suffering.
— Udana 8:3
From “The Four Sublime States: Contemplations on Love, Compassion, Sympathetic Joy and Equanimity”, by Nyanaponika Thera. Access to Insight (Legacy Edition), 30 November
Like This is a poem by Rumi, with a backdrop of a digital painting by Anne Corr
If anyone asks you
how the perfect satisfaction
of all our sexual wanting
will look, lift your face
and say,
Like this.
When someone mentions the gracefulness
of the nightsky, climb up on the roof
and dance and say,
Like this.
If anyone wants to know what “spirit” is,
or what “God’s fragrance” means,
lean your head toward him or her.
Keep your face there close.
Like this.
When someone quotes the old poetic image
about clouds gradually uncovering the moon,
slowly loosen knot by knot the strings
of your robe.
Like this.
If anyone wonders how Jesus raised the dead,
don’t try to explain the miracle.
Kiss me on the lips.
Like this. Like this.
When someone asks what it means
to “die for love,” point
here.
If someone asks how tall I am, frown
and measure with your fingers the space
between the creases on your forehead.
This tall.
The soul sometimes leaves the body, the returns.
When someone doesn’t believe that,
walk back into my house.
Like this.
When lovers moan,
they’re telling our story.
Like this.
I am a sky where spirits live.
Stare into this deepening blue,
while the breeze says a secret.
Like this.
When someone asks what there is to do,
light the candle in his hand.
Like this.
How did Joseph’s scent come to Jacob?
Huuuuu.
How did Jacob’s sight return?
Huuuu.
A little wind cleans the eyes.
Like this.
moving in time