Dear Subscriber First Name,There's a scientific reason why it's hard to get something static moving. Imagine pushing a car with a dead battery. The initial effort is enormous, but once it's rolling, everything becomes easier. It comes down to static friction, which creates microscopic bonds between an object and the ground. Once it's moving, you're only fighting kinetic friction, and the object has no time to form new bonds. I didn't know any of this until this until a few minutes ago! I'd woken up with the thought: wow, it's taking a lot of energy to get this project rolling, why is that? Then again, I'm also learning something about my own impatience. It's one of my saving graces, though I'm aware that it's patience that is listed as one of the qualities of the Buddha, not impatience. Patience, to me, is about accepting what is. Impatience, at its best, is about refusing to let your vision be obstructed. You need both: the relaxedness to trust the process and the drive to keep pushing the car. There is something to be said for following through on a vision, whether it's something as large as this new place of ours or something smaller, more personal, that you've been putting off. Obstacles will get in the way, and our own inertia, our static friction, is often the biggest one. Learn to trust your visions. I find that once I can picture something, a vision, then I desperately want to see it exist. Will it be like I imagined, or maybe even better? I first saw photos of this house just over a year ago and could immediately see it as a small retreat centre. Now it is one. That's the power of impatience. A friend reminded me recently that when we decided to sell the apartment and look for somewhere to run retreats, she imagined it taking around five years. It took one. There was luck involved, though it's hard to know exactly how much. What I do know is that getting things moving here has been a combination of my impatience and Dhammasiri's hard graft. She's unstoppable. And yet it's so easy to overlook all that we have done and see only what's still left to do: the screen around the outdoor shower, the outdoor kitchen, the hundred small things on the list. Maybe you know that feeling? We are just getting ready for our Midsummer retreat and I'm looking forward to having everything we've built witnessed by fresh eyes. Seeing what you've created through someone else's perspective is an important part of any process. Everyone joining us is an artist of some kind, and I'm so looking forward to nine days in their company, picking their brains and soaking up some creative energy. During the retreat I'll celebrate two birthdays: 59 years of life, and 29 years in the Buddhist Order I belong to, almost half my life. At ordination I was given the name Vajradarshini. The darshini part means vision, or seeing. We each need a vision for our lives, something to get out of bed for. It doesn't have to be grand, but it does have to move you. Perhaps you are creating a garden, and have a vision of what you'll grow next year. Or you're writing a book, and imagining it published out there in the world. Some people begin winding down as they approach 60. I feel as though I've just taken on my biggest project yet. Sometimes that feels a little daunting. But I trust that we are rolling now, and together with all of you who visit and practice here with us, we'll keep rolling into some as yet unseen future. If you’d like to come on retreat with us there are still spaces on the following:
Beauty and insight, a retreat on perception 8-15 August
Autumn gardening retreat 5-12 September
Ten Fetters retreat 19-26 September Curious about what we've been up to? We've been busy. Read the blog post below ⬇️
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