Here’s a post from this blog made almost a year ago. I’m reviewing “On the Way to Cushendall”  and found this signpost.

Things and “Waking Up”

Chop Wood, Carry Water

“Put your heart, mind, intellect and soul even to your smallest acts. This is the secret of success.”
Swami Sivananda

Work. What does the word mean to you? Is it something to be avoided? Is it a means to an end? Is it the only appropriate focus of your attention and energy? Is it a way to avoid the rest of your life? Is it a joy? Is it a part of  your spiritual practice?There is a Zen saying, “Before Enlightenment chop wood carry water, after Enlightenment, chop wood carry water.” What’s the difference? The tasks are the same. The need is the same. What about the frame of mind? Who is chopping? Who is carrying water?

When you labor, stay awake. Notice the frame of mind you bring to your work. Do you approach your work as if it were a nuisance? Do you remove your consciousness from work so that you are filled with resentment or worry?  What would you need to do to be more fully present in your work?

Practice mindfulness in work. It does little good to attain clarity of mind on your meditation cushion if you lose it as soon as you become active. Start with simple activities like brushing your teeth, ironing clothes, or washing dishes. Be fully alert as you move. Notice the position of your body in space. Notice the feelings in your body as you move. Pay attention to the thoughts that enter your mind when you do the task. See if you can let them go and just focus on the work itself.

If you are cleaning a countertop, feel the sponge in your hand. Feel the wetness. Feel the texture. Observe how the sponge moves in your hand from the sink to the counter. Sense your movements as you scrub. What do your eyes see? What do you hear as you work? Clean that countertop as if it were the most important thing you could do. Move with fluid motions. Waste no energy. Allow yourself the grace of economy of motion. Be grateful for the countertop, the sponge, the water, the soap. Be grateful for the hand, the arm, the whole body that can move a sponge. Be thankful for the floor you stand on and the roof that protects you. Without letting your mind wander too far, be grateful for all the circumstances that put you where you are at that moment with that sponge and that water and that countertop.

We travel to the ocean or to mountains, rivers and canyons, in part to escape the mundane world of work, but also to experience the awe that arises more spontaneously in nature’s magnificence. We give ourselves an incredible gift when we can  experience some of the same awe in the mundane world of our daily lives. The weed that grows in the crack of a sidewalk is a phenomenon as miraculous as the redwood tree that towers into the sky. The raindrops that streak the window are no less an occasion for awe than the spray that dampens our face at the waterfall. The fingers that tap a keyboard are as worthy of praise as the feet of a ballet dancer.

When we open awareness to the tasks in our lives they become lighter. When we are able to be in the moment, we no longer feel compelled to watch the clock. Whatever your work might be, bring all of yourself to it. When you are fully present, you may find that your labor is no longer a burden. Wood is chopped. Water is carried. Life happens.

http://www.interluderetreat.com/meditate/chop.htm

I am working on a project that was inspired by my time in Cushendall and by my years of spiritual contemplation, work with the oral tradition, and love of the relationship between pictures and words.

This post is to announce that this work is in progress and that the cards will be available in the future. If you are a “close friend,” I would love your feedback; when you sign in, you will see the cards. If you aren’t a “close friend” yet,  but know me personally, please let me know you would like to be a “close friend.” You can email me or submit a comment to this post.

My plan is to use the cards myself and to invite close friends to try them as well in order to have good company and feedback that will help me to refine the cards. I come not from the position of being a teacher, but rather as someone creating a joyful means for Self-contemplation.

I’m not a teacher; only a fellow traveler of whom you’ve asked the way. I pointed ahead– ahead of myself as well as you.

— George Bernard Shaw

You can cut and paste this link to see a video that connects us to the wonder life offers when we enter the space of the Heart.

TEDxSF – Louie Schwartzberg – Gratitude

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXDMoiEkyuQ

There is no enlightenment outside of daily life.

— Thich Nhat Hanh

What a great reminder that my current assignment is to find the mystical in the ordinary.

In every moment there is something more. Why run away to another time, another place? In this very moment there is something more.

In reality, all of life’s activities are part of the great sacrificial rite (mahayaga) externally enacted by universal consciousness within itself, to itself. In this rite, the sacrificial fire is the Great Void (mahasunya), the supreme reality entirely void of all division (bheda) and beyond the emptiness of insentience. The sacrificial ladle is awareness (cetana) and the offering is the entire outer universe of diversity, including the gross elements, senses, objects, world-orders and categories of existence, together with the inner world of mind (manas) and thought. All division between subject and object is burnt away and everything made one with the fire of consciousness.

— The Doctrine of Vibration, Dyczkowski, 142

My grandpa ran an insurance business in an office attached to his house in York, Pa. His desk top was covered with a sheet of glass, and under the glass were quotes from great people that he wanted to remember. He looked to them for inspiration in his day to day life. He took great interest in mathematics, history, and language. He was a scholar who never  went to college. He was charismatic in the way he captured people’s attention with his knowledge and storytelling skills. He recited poetry for me, which I loved. There is no question that he is my role model for the appreciation of inspirational quotes.

That said, I have to include Grandma (to whom I dedicated the second series of drawings), because she was devout, with an inner contemplative nature deftly hidden beneath a feisty and at times irreverent surface. Together, they tremendously contributed into making me who  I am.

Ben was their first great grandchild, the only one that my grandpa ever held. The joy my grandparents felt at Ben’s arrival into the world is revealed in the photos. In more than the obvious sense, I owe my very life to my grandparents. To be able to bring Ben to them was one of the great joys of my life.

Then, by becoming absorbed in the integral ‘I-ness’ which is the bliss of the light of consciousness and the power of the Great Mantra, (the yogi) achieves mastery of the circle of deities of this own consciousness who engender perpetually the emanation and withdrawl of all things.

— Ksemaraja, Pratyabhijnahrdaya (quoted in The Doctrine of Vibration, Dyczkowski, p. 127)