Jan 5-8 Verse 2

When people see some things as beautiful,
other things become ugly.
When people see some things as good,
other things become bad.

Being and non-being create each other.
Difficult and easy support each other.
Long and short define each other.
High and low depend on each other.
Before and after follow each other.

Therefore the Master
acts without doing anything
and teaches without saying anything.
Things arise and she lets them come;
things disappear and she lets them go.
She has but doesn't possess,
acts but doesn't expect.
When her work is done, she forgets it.
That is why it lasts forever.

This is a deep one. What I get from this is that we need opposites. If we were never sad how would we know happiness. And with the cold weather we have been having, I have never appreciated warm so much! If I wasn't so cold I would probably still enjoy warm, but not really LOVE it as I do now or be so aware of it.

The work lasting forever trips me up, I guess if you were ever done you would leave this world. I would love to hear your comments on this.

My friend, Libby, sent this email to me and I thought is was appropriate to this verse:

I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright no matter how gray the day may appear.

I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun even more.

I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive and everlasting.

I wish you enough pain so that even the smallest of joys in life may appear bigger...

I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.

I wish you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.

I wish you enough hellos to get you through the final good-bye.

Basically having enough positive to handle the negative. When I think about it some of my greatest moments came from succeeding after struggling, overcoming a hurdle, figuring out the answer, pushing the flipping kid all the way out.

There is a Chinese story of an old farmer who had an old horse for tilling his fields. One day the horse escaped into the hills and, when all the farmer's neighbors sympathized with the old man over his bad luck, the farmer replied, 'Bad luck? Good luck? Who knows?'
A week later the horse returned with a herd of wild horses from the hills and this time the neighbors congratulated the farmer on his good luck. His reply was, 'Good luck? Bad luck? Who knows?'
Then, when the farmer's son was attempted to tame one of the wild horses, he fell off its back and broke his leg. Everyone thought this very bad luck. Not the farmer, whose only reaction was, 'Bad luck? Good luck? Who knows?'
Some weeks later the army marched into the village and conscripted every able-bodied youth they found there. When they saw the farmer's son with his broken leg they let him off. Now was that good luck? Bad luck? Who knows?

I love this story but skew it a little. When I am having a negative/bad luck I think of the story and assume it is actually good luck hiding. When I am having a positive/good luck I try to enjoy it and disregard the chance that bad luck could be hiding.  

I found some exercises to do:

1.     List everything you have in your life that you don’t want, and then next to each item, list its opposite.

2.     List everything you want in your life that you don’t have, and then next to each item, list its opposite.

3.     Look at your two lists and “see” the dance of opposites that are now occurring in your life. Put your attention on the opposite you desire.

Try do the following in the next 4 days:

4.     Sit quietly and feel your breath, going in and out of your nostrils. Just feel the breath. From this point of feeling, observe the constant change going on in our mind. Just observe, without judgment. Practice this mindfulness technique for 5 minutes a day.

5.     Spend one day moving from project to project without thinking back on what you just did, or thinking forward to what the results of what you did will be. Move forward with each thing you do like a baby, first playing with his toes, then moving to fingers while toes are forgotten. Spend your day in innocence and peace.