Frat Boys, Dirty Jokes, and Seeing with the Heart
Tuesday, 4. December 2007, 17:04:14
"The essential is invisible to the eye. One only sees rightly with the heart."
Photo taken in a graveyard in Dieulivol, France (just up the hill form Plum Village). The quote is adapted from a conversation between the Fox and the Little Prince in The Little Prince, by Antoine de Ste-Exupery
Last night eight people showed up at our sangha meeting. As the evening wore on, the tiny flickering light of the yellow candle began to feel like a campfire, warming our spirits on a cold clear night.
On Sunday, I got a call from a friend from the Mindfulness Practice Center of Atlanta. "We're thinking of coming over to sit with y'all tomorrow night, and we're wondering if we can stay."
Monday afternoon, it turned out that all three of the guys living at the MPC of Atlanta were in town, high off a hike at Mt. Cheaha and a hat-buying expedition in Anniston, and they were ready to play.
Over dinner these men who've spent much more time than I have in various monasteries told dirty jokes, laughed raucously, and gave me a taste of what it must feel like to have fraternity brothers!
At our sangha meeting, we dozed in the warmth of the church during our sitting meditation, shivered in the freezing outside air during walking, and practiced deep listening to stories that made us go "hmmm."
Our little sangha is so rich. So rich with real, down-to-earth, courageous souls doing what we all need to do: taking care of sick husbands or sons, tucking teenage daughters into bed, teaching students, baking cookies.
Having the guys from Atlanta come over and surprise us was such a treat.
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And now, a quick note to all the folks who find this little site on the web. Hi! Hello to the mindful knitters. Hello to all the many folks all over the world who are looking for a mindful clock for the mac, and getting steered toward the awesome little widget that performs that function. Hello to the folks who were checking in on Deer Park during the fires. The folks who looked for guidelines for mindful eating before Thanksgiving. The folks who search for mindful poems to sustain your souls. The folks who bookmark this site and visit regularly.
It is wonderful that you are all there.
Thank you, too, for being a part of this teensy little group of folks who gather to sit, walk, smile, and share each Monday down near Oak Mountain, just south of Birmingham, Alabama.
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May our hearts be open
to see rightly
what is essential
today
and in the days
to come.
WIDGETIZE