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Brian Wilcox 'Red Roses ~ Maine'
To fully experience this life as a human being, we all need to connect with our desire to realize something larger than our individual selves.
*Thich Nhat Nhan. Silence.
* * *
The gentling of sea and wind -
On that day, when evening, he [Jesus] said to them [his disciples], "Let's sail over to the other side." Leaving the crowd, they took him along, as he was, in the boat. Other boats were with him. A gale arose, and the waves broke into the boat. Water was filling the boat. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. His disciples woke him and said, "Teacher, are you not concerned we're dying?!" He woke up and admonished the wind and spoke to the sea, "Be calm! Be quiet!" The wind abated; there was a vast stillness. Jesus said to his disciples, "Why are you fearful? Do you not yet trust?" They were awe-filled; they started saying to one another, "Who, then, is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?"
* * *
Gentle Radiance ~
Calm, Peace, Serenity
arising from Grace, Spirit, Self - God
not foreign, not outside to find
innate, natural, spontaneous.
Being awake
most-natural, normal
reminding others of
Home and all it offers of itself -
love, joy, peace ... - Spirit.
The Light
unborn, nonaggressive, peacemaking, being-peace.
Equanimity arises from and through
union with the Ineffable Source.
Quiet Joy not
psychological, merely, nor specifically religious or spiritual.
Grace!
Moments of calm call us to the Heart
to discover what we are summoned by
is luring us into the Good, True, and Beautiful,
in all Nature.
The scent of the Rose
is the Rose.
* * *
The monk and early desert-dweller, Evagrius Ponticus (345-399), wrote in Practike:
The proof of apatheia [lit., without suffering, passion] is that the nous [mind] begins to behold its (own) proper gentle radiance; that it remains tranquil in the presence of visions during sleep; and that it looks at matters calmly.
Apatheia was a central idea in Stoicism. The Christian Scriptures picks up on the Stoic ideal in Philippians 4.11-13, with the writer speaking of contentment (lit., Greek, "self-control') -
I'm not saying this due to need; for whatever circumstance I'm in, I've learned to be content. I know how to live with modest means, and I know how to live in prosperity. In any circumstance, I've learned the secret of contentment - both to be filled and to go hungry, to have plenty and to have want. I can adjust to life in any condition in [or, through] Christ, who strengthens me.
Continued... |
