… is insufficient. To be vital, faith must be accompanied by self sacrafice, and unselfish, constructive action.
p. 93, AA, working with others
Courage
The verdict of the ages is that faith means courage.
p. 62, AA How it works
Patience
Patience is a form of wisdom. It demonstrates that we understand and accept the fact that sometimes things must unfold in their own time.
Jon Kabat-Zinn
There is no other time than now
But whatever the future brings, it will not be what you expect, or what you think, and when it comes, it will be now too.
It too will be a moment that can be very easily missed, just as easily missed as this one.
And it too will be subject to continual change and the vagaries of all the causes and conditions that gave rise to it in previous moments.
For now is already the future and it is already here.
Arriving someplace more desireable at some future time is an illusion. This is it.
pp. 238-241, Coming to our Senses, Jon Kabat-Zinn
Thessalonians 4:11
… study to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands,…
Hebrews 11:2
Indeed, by faith our ancestors received approval.
Homo sapiens survival
Note that the word ‘sapiens’ itself is the present participle – indicating unfolding in the present moment – of the Latin verb ‘sacred”, to know, to taste, to perceive, to be wise.
Paying attention and atunement to these cycles of nature, of the day and of the hours and the seasons, long before there were clocks and calendars to mark the passage of time, were critical to survival.
pp. 145-146, Coming to Our Senses, Jon Kabat-Zinn
Reinforcement
… the necessity of ‘repetition’, ie the periodic recreation of the world – is not understood. The function of repetition (through ritual) is ‘existential’: it s the desire to continue life, the hope to prolong it, ad infinitum (commits to memory).
Merceia Eliade, Journals
p. 111, Thomas Moore, Education of the Heart
Rites and Reverence
If any of our actions lack care and thoughtfulness, they remain largely unconscious and raw.
Staying in touch with religious, cultural, and family traditions may also give out actions an impersonal, eternal quality that is essential to ritual.
p. 111, Thomas Moore, Education of the Heart
On suffering
“The only way out”, as Helen Keller wisely observed, “is through.”
P. 133, Coming to our senses, Jon Kabat-Zinn
