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When we are able to receive life's challenges as koans rather than problems, they become interesting and exciting, rather than ponderous and depressing.
Brenda Shoshanna -
Do not make this practice a source of pressure, compulsion, anxiety or pride. It is none of these. Zazen is simply a way to find your true home.
Brenda Shoshanna
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Now today, moment by moment, realize that each person and event that happens is life for you. Life is not somewhere else. See how fully you can accept the life that presents itself to you now.
Brenda Shoshanna -
It is a mistake to expect all of our needs to be met by one person or in one relationship. Honor and be grateful for that which you receive. Don't become bitter and spend all your time focusing on that which the person is not able to provide.
Brenda Shoshanna -
We learn the process of emptying out, cleaning house, both within and without.
Brenda Shoshanna -
When we sit, we open our own treasure house. Rather than do this, however, most of us first seek to find the treasures another person can provide. We calculate their value to us. When we approach relationships in this manner, we are coming as beggars, seeing the other as a source of supply. When we can enter a relationship with our treasure house already open, there is no end to the wonders we can find, both within and between ourselves and another.
Brenda Shoshanna -
In a relationship if you are giving and getting nothing back in return, stop giving so much, and spend time being. Give to yourself, be who you are.
Brenda Shoshanna -
Fear of the future and longing for the past are major factors which impede appropriate action.
Brenda Shoshanna
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Another simple and powerful way to dissolve problems is not to dwell upon the outcome of your actions. Instead, learn to value each action (no matter how small or large), to do it with complete attention. Your joy and satisfaction comes from doing each action with a whole heart and mind. Results and consequences then take care of themselves. When you are not absorbed by concern for outcomes, how much anxiety can you ever have?
Brenda Shoshanna -
Consider for a moment what you pay attention to all day long. What seems important to you, what do you take for granted and hardly attend to at all? Write it down. Do not judge your answers. Be honest and simple. As you keep track all week long, you'll be amazed at what claims your attention, what you give your precious life force to.
Brenda Shoshanna -
The sense that my world is stable and stationary, that change will never come and that all will go on continuously as it is, is the nature of all delusion.
Brenda Shoshanna -
Who you are is always enough. If your partner wants something different, it does not reflect upon you, but upon their needs and fantasies.
Brenda Shoshanna