Last month we began looking at the qualities that are helpful in cultivating inner peace. We
discussed that it takes courage to look at ourselves and go beyond our conditioning and our often
well guarded beliefs, perceptions, judgments and fears to reveal the ever present Peace within.
It has taken me nearly all month to get to the point of writing this article. It has been a slow
movement to the topic of patience. I've been having to hang out patiently with myself until the
creative forces moved me to write....hee, hee...
Patience
We live in a fast paced, instant gratification world. We expect perfect service 100% of the time,
we expect to receive what we want, when we want it. We expect others to believe what we believe
and to do things the way we would do them. If traffic doesn't move fast enough, our children aren't
ready in time, or the
dog just not cooperating we take it as a direct offense to our sense of entitlement to things
going our way and have little patience for it to be otherwise. If it is not logical or the way
we've always done it, we have very little patience to even consider another's view or idea.
We rush through the moments trying to get to the next because we believe some how the
next moment will be better, we will have accomplished something, fixed everything, be
happier, thinner, richer, have more, be more; so, there is no time to waste. Not much
patience in that belief system.
What if we took a moment, how about this moment, to stop. Completely. Stop moving,
stop worrying, stop grasping for the next moment.....and breathe. Watch the breath,
notice that in this moment we are fully supported without doing anything. And in this
moment notice a flower or a tree, the sky, the sun or the rain.
Notice that the tree is not impatient waiting for the seed, nor the bud impatient to become
a flower. The fullest expression is already recognized within the bud and the seed. Just as
our hopes, dreams and unfolding, our own fullest expression is already present within.
When we stop, take a breath, let go of the mind, we find a stillness, a patience that is already
perfectly present. It sees through the Divine eyes that everything is unfolding in Divine timing.
This patience is not of the mind but beyond it, it is felt deep within and is powerful as it carries
deep wisdom and understanding. It moves from a place of responding instead of reacting, from
power not force, from love not fear.
When we touch this patience within ourselves and breathe it into our awareness we can move more
freely within the world; more peacefully. We can extend this patience to all others. Our partner, a
clerk in the store, the traffic, our children. And we see that all is Divinely unfolding even when we
are not getting what we want when we want it - maybe, that is the greatest gift of the moment, to
bring us back to our breath and the peace that is within.
May we each be willing to live patiently by bringing a greater awareness into each moment; by
seeing beyond the surface of the situation and to know the Peace that is present which holds even
our greatest struggles in its loving arms.
| The Path of Peace - Patience January 2009 Newsletter Article by Kaycie |
Harmony Mandala
| Living in harmony with the circle of life |
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