Now reading “Now Zen” by Charlotte Joko Beck, a wonderful little pocket book, small enough to carry anywhere and even then only need a few pages to get you learning about new ways to experience life. It does seem a bit obtuse at times, but she makes several passes at each idea and one is bound to hit its target. It’s not the masterful teaching of Robert Bly, but valuable still.
Some ideas from the book and some inspired by the book:
“The world is constantly changing, and so our associations lead us astray.”
A Sufi story describes a man who is looking around the ground under a street lamp at night. A friend comes along and asks the man what he’s doing. The man replies, “looking for my keys.” “Do you remember where you were when you lost them?” asks the friend. “Yes,” replies the man, “I was across the street.” “Then why not look over there?” asks the friend. The man answers, “Because there’s more light here under the street lamp.”
Excerpt from a W.H. Auden poem:
We would rather be ruined than changed,
We would rather die in our dread
Then climb the cross of the moment
And let our illusions die
We choose relationships because they suit us, like a bowl of ice cream that is pleasant or at least not disagreeable. But relationships change because each of the participants change. And rather than run away and and start over, only to repeat the cycle, relationships can become the best reflection of ourselves, helping us to learn about ourselves through the feedback of others. Instead of running across the street where the familiar light shines, we must get on our hands and knees in the dark and explore the unfamiliar and strange and possibly dangerous. We must climb the cross and let our illusions die.
“Relationships are what we might call the slow death of the ego…A relationship is a great gift, not because it makes us happy – it often doesn’t – but because any intimate relationship, if we view it as practice, is the clearest mirror we can find.”