Saturday, February 22, 2025

I stumbled upon the writing of Pema Chödrön recently. I often find that we happen upon writings or music just when we need them. Maybe we need the full strength of what they have to offer in that moment, maybe we take a little and put it away in our tool box for a later time. I have been in a funk lately and this is a reminder that life is full of both beautiful moments and ugly ones. I will definitely take this in to help with my first world funk, as well as place it in my toolbox for the future.

“Life is glorious, but life is also wretched. It is both. Appreciating the gloriousness inspires us, encourages us, cheers us up, gives us a bigger perspective, energizes us. We feel connected. But if that's all that's happening, we get arrogant and start to look down on others, and there is a sense of making ourselves a big deal and being really serious about it, wanting it to be like that forever. The gloriousness becomes tinged by craving and addiction. On the other hand, wretchedness--life's painful aspect--softens us up considerably. Knowing pain is a very important ingredient of being there for another person. When you are feeling a lot of grief, you can look right into somebody's eyes because you feel you haven't got anything to lose--you're just there. The wretchedness humbles us and softens us, but if we were only wretched, we would all just go down the tubes. We'd be so depressed, discouraged, and hopeless that we wouldn't have enough energy to eat an apple. Gloriousness and wretchedness need each other. One inspires us, the other softens us. They go together.”

― Pema Chödrön, Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living