Three Truths and One Wish

This bunny somehow made it to the third floor of the parking garage yesterday

1. Truth: Every human just wants to be happy and safe. However, people can get confused about exactly how to make that work. Some of the ways we try and get to happy and safe actually end up causing harm, to ourselves and others.

2. Truth: We all just want to be loved, but again people get confused about how exactly to make that happen or even what love means or looks like. For example, someone spewing something as ugly as racism may very well have been taught that racism is good, and therefore to be racist is “being good,” and being good is the way to be loved.

3. Truth: The real work is dispelling our confusion. None of us is ever going to be happy, safe, or loved if we keep going after these things from a place of confusion. It only generates more suffering.

One wish: May we continue to make every effort to cultivate wisdom and compassion, sanity and kindness, in ways that actually manifest as happiness, safety, and love, and benefit the most people possible.

The view from my Eddy Hall office at CSU

1. Truth: What is easy for some is hard for me. Today I’m thinking in particular of how hard it is for me to simply relax into my truth, to give myself what I need without guilt or shame or anxiety or apology. Every choice I make, every hunger or longing, goes through an exhausting process of how it will affect others, what impact it will have, what other people will think about it and thus about me, whether or not I’ve “earned” it. It’s become a practice for me to simply want something and allow myself to have it, to feel ease or even joy, to relax with myself. It should be automatic, but I have to try, make so much effort to just be.

2. Truth: The turn towards fall feels so peaceful to me. You know how much I love summer, the garden with its blooms and fruit and vegetables and bugs and birds. The longer, lazy days, and all the light. However, fall is really my season. Dusk is also my favorite time of day and this season — the changing light, the cooler temperatures, green turning to gold and orange and red — feels similar, comfortable and calm. Like a dog sigh or the first sip of a cool glass of water when you are thirsty, permission to relax, a sense of relief and ease.

3. Truth: I feel myself slowing down. There were lots of things on the to-do list I made at the beginning of summer that haven’t been done yet. I still need to buy new bras and paint the house, and the new computer that was delivered weeks ago is still in a box. And yet, I know that I’ve spent a lot of years prioritizing doing and accomplishing over rest and contemplation, and that hasn’t served me. I’m tired. I long for rest. As difficult as it is, I’m going to give in to it.

One wish: May we honor our hunger, our longings, our need for rest, and may we thus find ourselves restored and open to ease and joy.