Has another day gone missing? I believe so. I have so many things on my ‘to do list’, and I promised myself today is the day to get them done, so naturally my husband woke up with a fever after not having slept the entire night. There I was, my plans for the day aside. The car was being serviced at the shop, there is no going anywhere. My hubby was feeling really bad and needed my help with this and that, and than finally fell asleep for an hour or two. Now could I get to work? Nope. I needed some things from the bedroom, if I walked in it would have woke him up, if I did anything else it would have made too much noise and than wake him up, and besides, I have to start getting lunch ready and do a bunch of other time consuming things around the house, and KEEP QUIET !
Where am I going with this? As I was washing the dishes (rrrrrr…. ) one of my FAVORITE dishes fell to the floor and broke. Actually two dishes fell but only one broke – the one I made, the one I care about. I made that dish in L.A when I was learning pottery, so not only was this dish really pretty, it was also a piece of personal history and therefore sentimental.
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| Oh, no, this is too sad ! |
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| it kinda looked like this before it broke, no pre-accident photos I'm afraid |
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| Ajahn Chah. respect. |
Now is the time for a Dharma story: once upon a time, in a far-away land, there lived a man, a Buddhist monk, who was considered by many to be a great teacher and more than that – to be enlightened. He had a large number of followers form all around the world, and a number of monasteries established in his tradition. His name was Ajahn Chah. The way I heard it (my sincere apologies if I’m getting the story wrong) goes like this: Monks in his tradition don’t hold many assets, among his very few possessions was a glass, a beautiful drinking glass which he cherished and wouldn’t let others use. When his disciples confronted him about his attachment to this object he dismissed it by saying that to him this glass is already broken.
He said:
“Can you prevent something that's breakable from breaking? If it doesn't break now it will break later on. If you don't break it, someone else will. If someone else doesn't break it, one of the chickens will! The Buddha says to accept this. He penetrated the truth of these things, seeing that this glass is already broken. Whenever you use this glass you should reflect that it's already broken. Do you understand this? The Buddha's understanding was like this. He saw the broken glass within the unbroken one. Whenever its time is up it will break. Develop this kind of understanding. Use the glass, look after it, until when, one day, it slips out of your hand... "Smash!" ... no problem. Why is there no problem? Because you saw its brokenness before it broke!”
(from what I heard, he still kept the glass to himself, though, he was after all, no body's fool )
So should I stop mourning over a broken piece of clay, even one with a really-really nice glaze? Is that what you’re trying to tell me, Ajahn ? yes, impermanence. Nothing stays still, better make peace with that one. pretty obvious when we think about it, still, I didn't expect my work to break !
on that note, as I was sitting in a cute little cafe to write this, impermanence appeared before me:
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| waiting for their owner to finish his coffee |
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| still waiting... |
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| "damn, I love your sexy ear !" |
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| and then they were gone... |
thought I'd share....
