Mindfulnesskc

The External Journey to Plum Village!

Win Grace tells us about her trip to Plum Village, so far....

I really wondered if Paul and I were going to actually get there when we had a FLAT tire 5 miles from home as we drove to the St. Louis airport.  I was ready to leave on time, and was using the practice of leaving to (for once) leave and prepare to leave relaxingly and mindfully.  The flat tire threw the whole mindful thing off, to say the least!  But Paul changed the tire in record time and we raced back to the house where we thankfully had another working car to use.  I mindlessly left the front door completely open with the keys in the door, but as we pulled out onto the road, I realized it (mindfully, panickingly!).  Whew!  Insanity!

All was well, though.  We got to the airport an hour ahead of time.  Then the flight to Chicago was delayed, then delayed again.  (Is this trip really going to happen?)  Then we sat on the tarmac for an hour waiting to take off, then we circled over Chicago for 30 minutes.  (Are we really going to get there?) Then our flight to Paris was delayed for de-icing (Yes, please, DO the de-icing.).  We were 2 hours late in leaving for Chicago.  Once we got on the plane, EVERYTHING completely smoothed out.  The plane was empty enough for everyone to stretch out and sleep. 

From that point -- we're really going to Plum Village!  Obstacles have been removed! 

Fast forward to Plum Village --

Flying Like A River

Thich Nhat Hanh encourages us to walk like a river when we practice walking meditation together.  Even though we are individuals, we move as one body.  This video of starlings "flying like a river", illustrates this beautifully.  Enjoy!

If your days were numbered, would you live your life differently?

By HELEN T GRAY
The Kansas City Star 02/08/2008

You have one month to live.

Surely you’d want to get the most out of your remaining days.

You’d want to live passionately, purposefully, the way we were created to live.

That is the premise of a new book called One Month to Live by Kerry and Chris Shook (WaterBrook Press, $19.99).

“By embracing the fact that our time on earth is limited, we can live deliberately, no longer postponing the joy and peace that come from fulfilling our God-given destiny,” say the authors, a husband and wife who founded Fellowship of the Woodlands Church near Houston.

Wanting to explore the topic further, we asked people of various faiths: “If you knew you had only one month to live, how would you live your life? Would you live your life differently than you are now?”

The answers proved similar to conclusions reached by the Shooks.

“Usually people with a strong faith don’t have as much fear of death,” Kerry Shook said in an interview with the couple. “They have a lot of peace, a clarity of purpose in living their lives.”

Yet the authors found that most people are not becoming what God wants them to be.

“Most people just go through the motions of life,” Kerry said. “We want to help people not just to exist but to come alive.”

The authors also acknowledged that some people are at the place God wants them to be.

One reason the couple wrote the book, subtitled Thirty Days to a No-Regrets Life, is that “we want to get to that place where if we heard that we had one month to live, we wouldn’t have much to change,” Kerry said

Toward that end the authors ask readers to sign a “One Month to Live Challenge” in which they “commit with God’s strength to live the next 30 days as if they are my last so I can experience life to the full.”

So far, members from about 500 churches across the country have taken up the challenge.

Many Kansas City area people of faith told us there’s not much they would change. Many said they were intentional in trying to live according to the dictates of their religion.

Meditation on Foot

by Karta Purkh Singh Khalsa (after our January Day of Mindfulness)

Walking, he merely
Lifted his foot as the world
Slipped by open eyes.