Peace in the Best of Times, in the Worst of Times

Peace.  It does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble, or hard work. It means to be in the midst of those things and still be calm in your heart.

-author unknown, on a coffee cup given to Linda by a friend

In the northern hemisphere, we’re heading into the calm, quiet, hunkering down season of winter, a chance for replenishment of body and spirit, the winter solstice a time of hope and vision for the turning of the dark to the light.

We’re also heading into a season of holy-days, a chance to celebrate with family and friends the blessings of our lives and the sharing of our visions for the future.

We’re also heading into what can be a craziness of holiday shopping, frenetic and de-centering. For many a time of deeper loneliness, estrangement from family and friends, feeling the outsider in a culture of yearned for merriment and mirth.

And for all of us, deeper underlying anxieties about political-social-economic upheavals and the very future of the planet.

I do teach that resilience is being in the midst of the difficulties and challenges of the season, any season, anchored in a calmness of heart, oriented toward possibilities and deeper connections with our fellow human beings, as both refuges and resources in the midst of those difficulties.

I teach that because I believe and deeply know the truth of that calm, that peace. I’ll be teaching that that inner peace and equilibrium is learnable, trainable, recoverable, sustainable, in the Bouncing Back: Moving Forward retreat at Spirit Rock Meditation Center, December 14-15, 2019. A time to find the calm in the heart in the midst of the disarray of our times.

Please join us if you can. May you deepen into that calm in your heart, in this season, in any season, in every season.