Haiku Ellipses...Invitation...Response...

HOME AGAIN feeling out of place someone looks at me and smiles i am home again sitting inside a Hindu temple entryway, waiting for my son's chess tournament to start, nearly everyone looked Hindu (brown faces, women in saris and men in dhoti's) coming in for a service (the tournament was in an adjoining social hall)...i felt "out of place" until one middle-aged Hindu woman smiled directly at me...i instantly felt seen, welcomed, and "at home"  practice: make the effort to intentionally smile while looking directly at people you see in the course of your everyday life if the circumstances feel appropriate...people in your household/family/roommates, co-workers, fellow students (and teachers), strangers on the street, acquaintances, friends, relations...let go of hoping for a positive response...if the smile is returned, good, if not, also good, as they probably needed it! let us connect with one another by smiling more often, helping the other feel seen, welc...

PERSPECTIVE      finding your true home it is not 'out there' beyond you it is hidden...right HERE the yellow part of the image is my yellow-framed glasses that i'm looking out of, seeing the page below me with my hands sketching...i cannot see my own head, i am headless from this point of view, the red heart is my real home, the center of awareness, the place of right HERE these ideas are part of the "headless way"--see Richard Land's book, Celebrating Who We Are based on the works of Douglas Harding...looking out from our eyes we see the world but not our own "head"--that is, we know who we are by looking into the faces of others, similar to the looking glass self of Mead, AND there are many more implications here... practice...what does it mean to look out at the world with eyes that cannot see themselves...where do you feel your center...heart, belly, head...all three? consider a decision you need to make today from the perspective of heart (feel...

LABELS see me with labels please don't put me in the box unlabel...set me free consider the labels that form your identity, both public and private, the ones others know you by and the ones you use for yourself...family, household, neighborhood, school, work, community, organizations, culture...all parts of you, AND which of these are the real you...all...some...none? what if we peeled off the labels and looked to the real person beneath the labels, the soul or spirit of the person...what kind of world would that create? practice: make a list of labels that people use when referring to you...another list of labels that you use for yourself...which resonate the most...least...can you let go of both? what would be left...what is the essence of who you really are at the core of your being...surely not a label...what then...perhaps this "essence" is the gateway to a deeper life   

10K THINGS starting at center 1 thought leads to the next thought then...10,000 things! from the one come ten thousand things [paraphrased] says the Tao Te Ching ...the complete lines are: The Tao gave birth to One / One gave birth to Two / Two gave birth to Three / Three gave birth to the ten thousand things. practice, observe your own thoughts in a 3-10 minute meditation...see how one thought leads to another...and another...ad infinitum...for fun, take one thought and trace it backwards to discover its origin...and where did that thought come from...and that...and...where is your center, your point of origin...see if you can rest there for a time without generating more thoughts...a little peace