Friday, August 24, 2007

What brings you peace?

When I created this piece, paste paper with collage, I got to the end and I thought, 'what would two Buddhists be saying in a conversation with each other?' Then I laughed, because of course, the point of meditation, whether done singly or in a group, is to quiet the "monkey mind" and bring peace to body and soul. So they would not be saying anything! I named the collage "At Peace."

These days I'm thinking, how many of us are at peace? What brings true peace? One thing that I constantly enjoy is meeting nice people, and being around nice people. When this happens, I'm surprised by peace.

I interviewed a man for a newspaper article the other day, and he was so charming and accommodating. When a thought stuck him he said, "Hey! My mother has more photos, you can go over there and look at them!" I laughed, saying I didn't even know his mother and she didn't know me, and besides, it was 8:30 in the morning! He called her right on the spot, and sent me over to her house. She and I had a great conversation and then I stayed longer, as we began talking about other subjects. That morning was a nice sojourn, meeting the two people who were so nice.

What brings you peace?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wonderful!!!

It goes back to the old adage in the Bible that you have to shed excess baggage to get through the eye of the needle.

Shedding baggage is a good way of unburdening ourselves from what keeps us from simplicity.

Chuck

Elizabeth Prata said...

It's really only people that count, not things. I feel that more and more!