Another orchid from the Buffalo Botanical Gardens.
Listening to: Another singer to fall in love with, and how does she make French sound so much like Persian?
Today's Bliss Formula: Sunday espressos, some planting, some gentle weeding. Time with each other and books and sun.
From Robert Thurman's Inner Revolution: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Real Happiness:
As mad with universal responsibility as I may be, I cannot get anything done without changing myself, without freeing myself from the routinized imagination and becoming a buddha myself. Then, I can create a world of love. I can create a mandala, a "soul-perfecting circle," a perfected environment wherein life itself is revealed as a process of transmutation of suffering into bliss.
Oh, my, this quote is filled to the brim with good stuff!
I love, in particular, this idea of creating a mandala in which we live. Envisioning your physical spaces, your whole life, your mind this way seems like spiritual alchemy.
What do you think?
7 comments:
To help the discussion:
Mandala is a Sanskrit word meaning cosmogram or "world in harmony."
"The symbolism of meditation Mandalas has a rich tradition. The outer form of these so-called holy circles is a geometrical diagram, a Yantra, and each detail of its construction has symbolic meaning. The essence or purpose of the Mandala is concerned with the process of invocation, the calling in and realization of the spiritual force within the contemplator himself. All these different picture-tools have essentially the same inner meaning and purpose, but there are mandalas to suit all levels of consciousness: for the spiritually highly developed, for average people and for people not yet developed.(...) Tibetan monks constructing a festival mandala with sand and the dust of precious stones. After the festival the mandala will be destroyed, thus expressing the insubstantiality of visible forms." http://www.buddhanet.net/mandalas.htm
Wow! What a neat idea!
My mandala has several areas that need attention right now. Many areas are becoming increasingly more beautiful, while others remained cluttered and out of focus.
Thanks for this analogy. And for all your posts. I really enjoy reading your thoughtful, inspiring blog.
Thank You, this is geat!
I know you are speaking metaphorically in making your life a mandala but if you are interested in exploring this in a creative medium such as pen/pencil here a link that I love that is chuck full of inspiration:
http://artineveryday.blogspot.com/2007/09/making-your-own-mandala-medicine.html
She also has a website on her side bar that has the link to another site that she posts many of her drawing to. I have a drawing pad full of Mandalas that I have created since visiting her site last year. It is soooo much fun.
so happy to have stumbled across your blog--i'll be back. lots of great stuff here.
Goethe said that everything is a metaphor, so, Dawn, I think perhaps the other is true too -- that everything is concrete, meaning that it is through the concrete that we learn metaphorical truths -- so your idea to actually CREATE mandalas is awesome. Thanks for the info.
Keith Knudson does these wonderful personal Mandalas, using your personal information. I found mine to be really interesting
http://www.lifeisblog.com/weekly-topic.html
I was a bit taken back by it initially, especially after I saw all of the beautiful symetrical ones posted on his site...but I came to be comfortable with the drama and power of it
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