"Mindfulness and Meditation allow us to open our hearts, relax our bodies, and clear our minds enough to experience the vast, mysterious, sacred reality of life directly. With Practice we come to know for ourselves that eternity is available in each moment.

Your MMM Courtesy Wake Up Call:
Musings on Life and Practice
by a Longtime Student of Meditation

Thursday, November 12, 2015

Silence is Golden

 “Be still.  Stillness reveals the secrets of eternity. 
When there is silence one finds the anchor of the universe within oneself” 
― Lao Tzu

 "Be still and know that I am God."

― Proverbs 46:10 

There were fifteen of us gathered to Sit Together in Stillness at the Recovery Learning Community's Greenfield Center last night.  The Silence was Golden.  As I rang the bell to end our first period of meditation, bowed and looked around the room, I knew that I wasn't alone in feeling the Presence.  The energy was palpable. As one person mentioned as we went around the Circle to compare notes on Practice, "you could hear the silence!" Others nodded. Everyone knew exactly what she meant.

I love it when that happens.

Our essential Oneness becomes less theoretical.

Immersed as we are in a patently materialistic society, a milieu that fosters greed, speed, fear and frustration, we have been conditioned to experience our world through mental and emotional states that manifest a lot of noise and motion.  Bombarded with stimulation and stress, our minds habitually filled with incessant chatter, most of us have spent untold hours being constantly distracted and disconnected from our True Nature.  

Coming to rest in the clear, open and spacious quality of consciousness that emerges as we Sit in Stillness is a precious experience.  Unfortunately,  it's all too rare. That has enormous consequences -- and not only for our individual happiness.  A glance at the evening's news makes it obvious: the future of our planet hangs on it.  More of us need to get our act together.  

Thich Nhat Hanh and thousands Sit in Silence, London, 2012
Thankfully, this does seem to be happening. What we experienced in that room yesterday is happening more and more around the world. And as more of us turn toward the Practice (in whatever form it takes), as more of us take the time to Sit Still and rest in the embrace of the Silence, we just might be able to manifest the type of kindness, compassion and wisdom that is needed to save this ole suffering world.

It's a tough job, but somebody's got to do it, right?
 
Passing the Hat for the RLC's Greenfield Center

The Wednesday (and Tuesday) Mindfulness Circles take place at the Recovery Learning Community's Greenfield Center, the hub of a vibrant and very special peer support community here in Western Massachusetts.   It's existence has been threatened by a recent shift in the town's priorities for CDBG funding.  With a bit more compassion for my friends in the clergy who have to do this all the time, I'd like to "pass along the donation basket" and ask you to consider to join in the effort to Save the RLC's Greenfield Center. 


If you'd like know more about this: Here's a guest column I wrote for our local daily:

Here's a 5 minute video on the effort:
https://www.youcaring.com/western-mass-recovery-learning-community-rlc-419925
(You can also make a donation at that link or the button to the left) 

and, if you still want more:
In his own inimitable -- and a bit more blatantly political -- style,
my identical twin Brother Lefty blogged about it yesterday as well!
Rambling On with Brother Lefty Smith, S.O.B.*


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