Teressa was beautiful and accomplished but there were many nights when she cried herself to sleep, wondering if she would ever find her soulmate. My friend Frank was also going through a difficult time; his wife had announced she wanted a divorce and he was still reeling from the shock.
A couple months after Frank’s separation, he received a Facebook friend request from the girlfriend who broke his heart at nineteen. It was Teressa. She had (more…)
While pursuing desires is an integral part of the dance of life, you are on the road to peace when you learn to control your cravings instead of allowing your cravings to control you.
Conscience is the voice of the soul, as passions are the voice of the body. No wonder they contradict each other.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Fulfilling your desires can produce occasional bursts of happiness, but the pleasures of the material world are often fleeting.
Detachment does not require a life of renunciation. It simply reorders your priorities so that even as you delight in (more…)
Detaching from results does not hinder your enjoyment of doing the work you feel called to do. Instead, it liberates you from worrying about the outcome, which frees you up to savor the present moment instead of looking past it.
Buddha stated that the core message of his teaching was, “Nothing should be clung to as me or mine.” Indian guru Nisargadatta Maharaj sagely added that enlightenment was also reachable through the mindset of “Everything should be clung to as me or mine.”
Contradiction is not a sign of falsity, nor the lack of contradiction a sign of truth.
Blaise Pascal
These seemingly competing statements present a compelling paradox of perspectives; yet, upon closer examination, they coexist in perfect harmony. Buddha’s dictum (more…)
When a certain outcome is desired, some people choose to “let go and let God” while others adopt an aggressive “do it yourself” mindset.
Although these approaches seem to be perched on opposite ends of the goal-getting spectrum, they actually dovetail perfectly. Reconcile them by doing what you feel guided to do while staying open to unanticipated outcomes.
If your sights are set on the prize behind door number one, your job is to work your way up to the door, not to kick it in. Why? Once you (more…)
If your happiness depends on achieving your goals precisely as you have envisioned, on events consistently unfolding according to your wishes, or on other people doing exactly what you want them to do, you are condemning yourself to a lifetime of misery.
When you insist that you have total control over circumstances beyond your control, you are announcing to the universe that you know better than God what is best for you.
Detaching from outcomes does not mean that you are apathetic and unmotivated. Quite the contrary: detachment means that you care deeply, but from an objective, enlightened perspective. (more…)
Last summer, my marriage ended. I didn’t want it to, but the gap between our lifestyles kept widening, and splitting up soon became the obvious course of action. I was heartbroken, but from the start I recognized that there was great value in my grieving process.
I’m sharing what I went through in the hope that the process that helped me recover relatively quickly may offer some comfort to others who are hurting. It took me four months to heal, which is far better than four years . . . or forever. You can recover from a broken heart. You can heal. You can be whole again.
