Have Heart

One day a student of zen told her teacher that she was having a hard time meditating. Worse still, having studied for several years, she was feeling like she’s made no progress at all. “I am discouraged,” she said. “Can you tell me what I should do to overcome this?” The zen master smiled and said, “encourage others.”
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This is a story I think about on a weekly basis.  Which is, perhaps, a confession of how frequently i feel discouraged. But as with so many seemingly simple zen tales, there is an onion's worth of layers to this tale to be revealed. When i stop to notice the world around me, something i should always be doing more of, i see encouragement everywhere. And i feel this a necessary medicine in this dire times. I am reminded of Talmudic wisdom, "Every blade of grass has an angel that bends over it whispering, 'grow, grow.'" Such abundance.

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