Life Is What Happens To You After You Make Your Plans...
That's a quote I've been fond of for years, for it captures so much in one simple line.--the ever uncertain nature of the world and the marvelous creative energy that lies in every moment. No matter how patterned or steady your life course might seem, the world has a way of manifesting something completely unexpected at times. Events emerge from the infinite possibilities of the future, and it is said that at any given moment you are exactly in the right place where any possible future can take you.
Such thoughts urge us to be present, and fully aware, of this very moment, open to whatever it holds and any possibility it may bring. Anything could emerge from the mysterious weave of life--a sudden opportunity or challenge; a tragic event, or a chance encounter that leads to a new love. Yours is just to be there when it happens, and not lost in any of a thousand places we hide each day, distracted, amused, bothered, frustrated or impatient--too busy with our plans to realize what is happening. These "thousand nothings of the hour" as Matthew Arnold wrote in The Buried Life, might seem inconsequential, but could also hold the seed of some major transformation in your life, if you but attend and open to the energy that is present.
You will know such moments when they come to you because of the easy, effortless flow of your life into the change that presents itself. Change can sometimes be tumultuous and jarring, as in events like the 9/11 attacks. But it can also come in the soft first light as you meet a new person, a quiet transition that happens for you when you realize you completely resonate and rest in the other, without any pretense, or strain, or effort of any kind. New love is this way. It feels like a suit of clothes that was made just for you, an easy fit, and you just feel great. So pay attention the next time you are at Starbucks! You could meet someone at a cafe that could change your life forever!
Arnold talks about the constant din of the world, and of how we strive so that we sometimes lose touch with our inner selves, that buried stream of life within us that flows on and on, even though we do not fathom its depths. This "unregarded River of our Life" is always there, whether we heed it or not, and each moment presents us with a chance to put our hand into the stream, if we can but relinquish our expectations and just be present. There is a Zen poem that goes: "He would not give me lodging! How disagreeable it was. But yet, through his kindness, I can sleep this night beneath the Cherry Blossoms, under this moonlit sky!"
So in every moment, even those that seem to hold loss, frustration, setback--those rocks in the stream we all encounter--find a way to see what is present and open to the gift that moment could become for you if you simply pay attention there. Anything could happen! So whatever it is that besets you, good or bad--a lost job, or home, or love--just keep your heart open and pay attention. You could miss your connection at an airport and suddenly realize you now have that time you've been wanting to write a letter to someone special. You could lose something, or someone, you once thought you could never live without, and discover that was what simply had to happen in order for the the bounty of this moment to be before you now.
And you will know it to a certainty when you find the stream of your life in the here and now. Perhaps you made a recent move, or changed jobs, and the place just seems so very right when the change comes. That is the easy flow of your life into the newness of here and now. You are more awake at such times, bright with the energy of discovery. And for new love Arnold has this to say:
"Only--but this is rare--
When a beloved hand is laid in ours,
When, jaded with the rush and glare
Of interminable hours,
Our eyes can in another's eyes read clear,
When our world-deafened ear
Is by the tones of a loved voice caressed--
A bolt is shot back somewhere in our breast
And a lost pulse of feeling stirs again;
The eye sinks inward, and the heart lies plain,
And what we mean, we say, and what we would, we know.
A man becomes aware of his life's flow,
And he hears its winding murmur, and he sees
The meadows where it glides, the sun, the breeze...
The hills where his life rose,
And the sea where it goes."
So pay attention! Someone could take your hand one day and dip it gently into the buried, inner stream of your life--and they could do this just with the sublime look of joy they have on their face when they bite into a drumbstick ice cream cone, covered with chocolate and peanuts!
Life will never work out just the way you wish, or hope, or dream. But it will work out just the way it is now--in everything that happens to you after you make your plans. Seize this moment in the palm of your hand and you are truly alive.
That's a quote I've been fond of for years, for it captures so much in one simple line.--the ever uncertain nature of the world and the marvelous creative energy that lies in every moment. No matter how patterned or steady your life course might seem, the world has a way of manifesting something completely unexpected at times. Events emerge from the infinite possibilities of the future, and it is said that at any given moment you are exactly in the right place where any possible future can take you.
Such thoughts urge us to be present, and fully aware, of this very moment, open to whatever it holds and any possibility it may bring. Anything could emerge from the mysterious weave of life--a sudden opportunity or challenge; a tragic event, or a chance encounter that leads to a new love. Yours is just to be there when it happens, and not lost in any of a thousand places we hide each day, distracted, amused, bothered, frustrated or impatient--too busy with our plans to realize what is happening. These "thousand nothings of the hour" as Matthew Arnold wrote in The Buried Life, might seem inconsequential, but could also hold the seed of some major transformation in your life, if you but attend and open to the energy that is present.
You will know such moments when they come to you because of the easy, effortless flow of your life into the change that presents itself. Change can sometimes be tumultuous and jarring, as in events like the 9/11 attacks. But it can also come in the soft first light as you meet a new person, a quiet transition that happens for you when you realize you completely resonate and rest in the other, without any pretense, or strain, or effort of any kind. New love is this way. It feels like a suit of clothes that was made just for you, an easy fit, and you just feel great. So pay attention the next time you are at Starbucks! You could meet someone at a cafe that could change your life forever!
Arnold talks about the constant din of the world, and of how we strive so that we sometimes lose touch with our inner selves, that buried stream of life within us that flows on and on, even though we do not fathom its depths. This "unregarded River of our Life" is always there, whether we heed it or not, and each moment presents us with a chance to put our hand into the stream, if we can but relinquish our expectations and just be present. There is a Zen poem that goes: "He would not give me lodging! How disagreeable it was. But yet, through his kindness, I can sleep this night beneath the Cherry Blossoms, under this moonlit sky!"
So in every moment, even those that seem to hold loss, frustration, setback--those rocks in the stream we all encounter--find a way to see what is present and open to the gift that moment could become for you if you simply pay attention there. Anything could happen! So whatever it is that besets you, good or bad--a lost job, or home, or love--just keep your heart open and pay attention. You could miss your connection at an airport and suddenly realize you now have that time you've been wanting to write a letter to someone special. You could lose something, or someone, you once thought you could never live without, and discover that was what simply had to happen in order for the the bounty of this moment to be before you now.
And you will know it to a certainty when you find the stream of your life in the here and now. Perhaps you made a recent move, or changed jobs, and the place just seems so very right when the change comes. That is the easy flow of your life into the newness of here and now. You are more awake at such times, bright with the energy of discovery. And for new love Arnold has this to say:
"Only--but this is rare--
When a beloved hand is laid in ours,
When, jaded with the rush and glare
Of interminable hours,
Our eyes can in another's eyes read clear,
When our world-deafened ear
Is by the tones of a loved voice caressed--
A bolt is shot back somewhere in our breast
And a lost pulse of feeling stirs again;
The eye sinks inward, and the heart lies plain,
And what we mean, we say, and what we would, we know.
A man becomes aware of his life's flow,
And he hears its winding murmur, and he sees
The meadows where it glides, the sun, the breeze...
The hills where his life rose,
And the sea where it goes."
So pay attention! Someone could take your hand one day and dip it gently into the buried, inner stream of your life--and they could do this just with the sublime look of joy they have on their face when they bite into a drumbstick ice cream cone, covered with chocolate and peanuts!
Life will never work out just the way you wish, or hope, or dream. But it will work out just the way it is now--in everything that happens to you after you make your plans. Seize this moment in the palm of your hand and you are truly alive.
