Monday, October 30, we will meet online.
Dear friends,
This week we will meet online on Monday 7-8:30PM EDT, in person (3812 Northampton Street NW in DC) on Wednesday morning from 7-8AM, and online on Friday 12-1PM.
On Monday evening, Ellen will facilitate. Our focus will be on Thich Nhat Hanh’s important teachings about our “habit energy.” We’ll watch a very short video from Thay that helps us recognize our habit energy and how to compassionately tend to it.
This is a very timely topic for me. The world seems frayed, pained, pulled apart and almost at its limits these days. Pain and tension seem to be everywhere. Tragedies abound. For me, that’s somehow made my habit energies intensify. Maybe it’s a false sense of being ok if I’m busy.
Thay says in The Pocket Thich Nhat Hahn: “We have to learn the art of stopping – stopping our thinking, our habit energies, our forgetfulness, the strong emotions that rule us.”
But for many of us, it’s not so easy to stop.
This summer, we took an unexpected trip to Provence, France and were delighted to learn we’d arrived just before the annual harvesting of the fields of lavender. They are breath-takingly beautiful with an incredible scent. One simply just has to stop, gaze, smell and be amazed. It brings to mind the old saying “Nowhere to go, nothing to do…” that we’ve said or sung many times in sangha.
Being mindful, being present to ourselves, our family and our friends is a powerful antidote to our “habit energies.”
I look forward to hearing your thoughts about this – or whatever is on your heart – next Monday evening in person.
Ellen