You know, of course, that I've been longing to talk with you. Please don't misinterpret my silence. All sorts of thoughts, words, memories, images were scrambling across the stage of my mind. The thing is, for the moment I just couldn't find a way to make any of them harmonize with your need for space.
I miss you dearly
--yours, Matthew
..
"To find balance . . . you must stop looking at the world through your head. You must look through your heart, instead"--Ketut
.................
The above quote is from Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love. Ketut is the Balinese medicine man who teaches her to meditate with love rather than discipline, to meditate with a smile.
The book has been (finished last night) the perfect thing for me to read in these days of mourning for the change that has taken place in my relationship with Margo. Just what that change is and will be is difficult for me to say, although most people would probably have more definitive words for the whole thing. But Margo and I are the types of people for whom there are no goodbyes, to paraphrase Gandhi from the eponymous movie. For me, the relationship has changed, morphing into a different phase, and doubtless it will change again with time. . . and only time knows what way that will go.
EAT, PRAY, LOVE
"To find the balance you want,. . . you must keep your feet grounded so firmly on the earth that it's like you have four legs, instead of two. That way, you can stay in the world. But you must stop looking at the world through your head. You must look through your heart, instead. That way, you will know God."
. . . [as Ketut reads her palm]
"You have more good luck than anyone I've ever met," Ketut says. [This reminds me of Margo. She considers herself blessed, and then with that perspective, she sees all of the goodness in life, and with the peace and happiness that follows, things always fall into place for her. They work out. Other people see things from the opposite perspective. They feel slighted by life, and their lives are poisoned by worry, loss, and regret. I know which life I want]
Back to Ketut's words: "You have more good luck than anyone I've ever met . . . You only have one problem in your life. You worry too much. Always you get too emotional, too nervous. If I promise you that you will never have any reason in your life to ever worry about anything, will you believe me?"
I AM bowled over with this thought
It's all about faith, which I've decided is the theme for my new year--my New Year's resolution, alla Margo. FAITH
If I have faith that I don't have anything to worry about . . . then . . .
Well, that's the key to happiness. And it's that worldview of Margo's that I've been talking about wherein we feel blessed with what we have and we know that good things will happen to us because this is a charmed, wonderful gift of a life that we've been given
(76) Protestants (Midwesterners, say) feel in control of their lives because they seem themselves as free agents doing good acts in this life.
Catholics (Italians) feel that life is fated, and they can't even make a dinner appointment two weeks out because they don't feel in control of their destiny
(100) "What is the nature of the universe?"--friend: "Why ask?"
(104) What is your one word? "Seek"? "Feel"?Maybe it's "feel" for me. Rome's is "sex"
(115) Sicilians . . . "the appreciation of pleasure can be an anchor of one's humanity"
INDIA
Om Namah Shivaya--I honor the divinity that resides within me
Our whole business therefore in this life . . is to restore to health the eye of the heart whereby God may be seen" (Saint Augustine)
(152) [as a precocious child] "another one gone. The closer I watched time, the faster it spun, and that summer went by so quickly that it made my head hurt, and at the end of every day I remember thinking, "another one gone," and bursting into tears
(183) Guilt's just your Ego's way of tricking you into thinking that you're making moral progress. Don't fall for it, my dear."
(200) "Why have I been chasing happiiness my whole life when bliss was here the entire time?
On love and whether or not you've found someone you can spend your life with:
"Do you want your belly pressed against this person's belly forever--or not?"
(315) "You love new boyfriend?
I think so. YUes.
Then you must spoil him. And he must spoil you.:
OK, I promised"
"So me and my lover, we take off our shoes, we pile our small bags of belonging on the tops of our heads and we prepare to leap over the edge of that boat together, into the sea.
I say: "Attraversiamo"
Let's cross over
"To find balance . . . you must stop looking at the world through your head. You must look through your heart, instead"--Ketut
.................
The above quote is from Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love. Ketut is the Balinese medicine man who teaches her to meditate with love rather than discipline, to meditate with a smile.
The book has been (finished last night) the perfect thing for me to read in these days of mourning for the change that has taken place in my relationship with Margo. Just what that change is and will be is difficult for me to say, although most people would probably have more definitive words for the whole thing. But Margo and I are the types of people for whom there are no goodbyes, to paraphrase Gandhi from the eponymous movie. For me, the relationship has changed, morphing into a different phase, and doubtless it will change again with time. . . and only time knows what way that will go.
EAT, PRAY, LOVE
"To find the balance you want,. . . you must keep your feet grounded so firmly on the earth that it's like you have four legs, instead of two. That way, you can stay in the world. But you must stop looking at the world through your head. You must look through your heart, instead. That way, you will know God."
. . . [as Ketut reads her palm]
"You have more good luck than anyone I've ever met," Ketut says. [This reminds me of Margo. She considers herself blessed, and then with that perspective, she sees all of the goodness in life, and with the peace and happiness that follows, things always fall into place for her. They work out. Other people see things from the opposite perspective. They feel slighted by life, and their lives are poisoned by worry, loss, and regret. I know which life I want]
Back to Ketut's words: "You have more good luck than anyone I've ever met . . . You only have one problem in your life. You worry too much. Always you get too emotional, too nervous. If I promise you that you will never have any reason in your life to ever worry about anything, will you believe me?"
I AM bowled over with this thought
It's all about faith, which I've decided is the theme for my new year--my New Year's resolution, alla Margo. FAITH
If I have faith that I don't have anything to worry about . . . then . . .
Well, that's the key to happiness. And it's that worldview of Margo's that I've been talking about wherein we feel blessed with what we have and we know that good things will happen to us because this is a charmed, wonderful gift of a life that we've been given
(76) Protestants (Midwesterners, say) feel in control of their lives because they seem themselves as free agents doing good acts in this life.
Catholics (Italians) feel that life is fated, and they can't even make a dinner appointment two weeks out because they don't feel in control of their destiny
(100) "What is the nature of the universe?"--friend: "Why ask?"
(104) What is your one word? "Seek"? "Feel"?Maybe it's "feel" for me. Rome's is "sex"
(115) Sicilians . . . "the appreciation of pleasure can be an anchor of one's humanity"
INDIA
Om Namah Shivaya--I honor the divinity that resides within me
Our whole business therefore in this life . . is to restore to health the eye of the heart whereby God may be seen" (Saint Augustine)
(152) [as a precocious child] "another one gone. The closer I watched time, the faster it spun, and that summer went by so quickly that it made my head hurt, and at the end of every day I remember thinking, "another one gone," and bursting into tears
(183) Guilt's just your Ego's way of tricking you into thinking that you're making moral progress. Don't fall for it, my dear."
(200) "Why have I been chasing happiiness my whole life when bliss was here the entire time?
On love and whether or not you've found someone you can spend your life with:
"Do you want your belly pressed against this person's belly forever--or not?"
(315) "You love new boyfriend?
I think so. YUes.
Then you must spoil him. And he must spoil you.:
OK, I promised"
"So me and my lover, we take off our shoes, we pile our small bags of belonging on the tops of our heads and we prepare to leap over the edge of that boat together, into the sea.
I say: "Attraversiamo"
Let's cross over
