31

7 Jun

Love the excerpt below.

Nothing Solid by Pema Chodron

Moving away from our experiences, moving away from the present moment with all our habits and strategies, always adds up to restlessness, dissatisfaction, unhappiness. The comfort that we associate with concretizing and making things solid is so transitory, so short-lived. 

Moving into our experiences- whether it’s the opening experience of love and compassion or the closing-down experience of resentment and separation- brings us an enormous sense of freedom: the freedom of nothing solid. Something about “nothing solid” begins to equal freedom. In the meantime, we discover that we would rather feel fully present to our lives than be off trying to make everything solid and secure and engaging our fantasies or addictive patterns. We realize that connecting with our experiences by meeting it feels better than resisting it by moving away. Being on the spot, even if it hurts, is preferable to avoiding. As we practice moving into the present moment this way, we become more familiar with groundlessness, a fresh state of being that is available to us on an ongoing basis. This moving away from comfort and security, this stepping out into what is unknown, uncharted, and shaky- that’s called liberation. 

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6 Responses to “31”

  1. gregorychankins June 7, 2012 at 9:51 am #

    Thanks for sharing this, Kate. It fits well into my day.

  2. Wendell A. Brown AKA The Brown One Poet June 7, 2012 at 10:57 am #

    Beautiful Kate!

  3. righteousbruin9 June 7, 2012 at 7:57 pm #

    New experiences are sometimes hard to incorporate, indeed. I’ve had so many recently, I am grateful for this night, in a comfortable room that i can barely afford. It gives me a place to sort out all that’s gone on.

    That’s a beyond-awesome photo.

    • katemcclafferty June 7, 2012 at 8:56 pm #

      You touched me with your comment. I am grateful to have you as a reader. Safe travels:)

  4. Miriam Linderman (@MiriamLinderman) June 8, 2012 at 9:59 am #

    Thank you for Nothing Solid. I needed that and it was perfect.

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