Difficulties are part of every life.
Hard times are not a mistake. You haven’t done something wrong to have hard times….. life is woven with praise and blame and gain, and loss and pleasure, and pain and disrepute for all of us. And those constantly change.
So the spiritual life is not about avoiding loss and blame and difficulty
but taking those difficulties that come to us and using them to awaken a wise and free and compassionate heart no matter what.
And often it’s in the very difficulties that the greatest freedom comes to us.
Jack Kornfield, Difficult Times and the Crystal of Liberation
Posted by Paging Mrs Zen on September 14, 2018 at 1:36 am
Reminds me of a Pema Chodron quote “Pain is not a punishment, pleasure is not a reward.”
Posted by Marty on September 14, 2018 at 2:52 am
I like that