Day 04b: Remembering to SEE the Flowers … (09/12/18)
A “good life” might very well mean pausing during the tough times to notice and appreciate the flowers — to count our blessings; to focus on what we have instead of what we don’t; to embrace what is as opposed to pining for what could be. That having been said, this self-focused “good life” — while indeed possible to attain — is not in any way, shape, or form a truly Good Life. For the former is always striving & yearning — ever clinging to pleasures & comforts destined to fade, and ever desiring improvements & betterments that almost never come to pass. The latter — the truly Good Life, on the other hand, is the life that continually sets aside the aforementioned selfish impulses in favor of actively re-Membering the following three Truths:
*01) That in every moment of our lives there is always another sentient being nearby who merits (and in truth probably needs) an act of selfless kindness — a soft smile, a warm embrace, a sincere compliment, a joyous exclamation etc — and that it is always Right for us to act accordingly.
*02) That every single person we encounter during every single one of our days is at best a saint worthy of our honor and at worst a saint who has merely temporarily forgotten the same — and that it is always Right to dignify the former with acts of humble caring and awaken the latter by extending to them the very same.
*03) That we can always reasonably sit back in sadness or regret about past paths not taken; paths that we errantly chose not to take — paths that indeed might very well have been “better” or in some ways more Meaning-full or transformative to self or others. And yet we can also always remember that everything in our current Here & Now remains fully viable — awake and alive and pulsing with latent-yet-profound Peace that is ready to be brought forth during every one of our subsequent acts of bold gentleness.
In essence, the truly Good Life comes not when we pause in our darker moments to merely see the flowers, but rather washes over us fully & completely in every moment we choose to BE those same blossoms for any & all nearby.
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