Organ Mountain Zen



Friday, May 22, 2009

The Word for World is Balance

With palms together,
Good Morning Everyone,

Water is a wonderful metaphor. It yields, yet is so strong it erodes mountains into canyons. It remains water as it moves from liquid to vapor and back. Water reveals its essential nature in its visible life cycle for all of us to see and, in this, it is a wonderful teacher.

As I look out my bedroom window, I see heavy clouds. They seem pregnant and the weather site suggests they will give birth today. Water is so necessary, rain is the seed of life.

I consider Mars, the angry planet, and understand it is bereft of water. A thin atmosphere, distant from the sun. Anger burns away love. When we are angry, we cannot nurture. Where there is anger there can be no life.

Venus, clothed in heavy clouds, close to the sun, thought to be a metaphor for love. Venus teaches me that to be draped in heavy bonds may be lethal. While love can nurture, it can also suffocate.

We have the beauty of residing on a planet where the metaphor is balance. Too little love, arid. Too much love, suffocation. Both Venus and Mars are inhospitable to life. On Earth we are in harmony. A lesson here as we are moving out of harmony: consuming, burning, suffocating in our own waste. Teachers are everywhere When we let our arrogance drop away we are able to see them.

As Buddha taught, when the string is too tight, it will break; when too loose, it will not play. The Middle Way is the Living Way.

Be well.

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