Mindfulness: Your True Home

Your True Home: the Everyday Wisdom of Thich Nhat Hanh is about mindfulness, the stillness of the mind, the here and now, and above all a sense of contentment and peace.  It is probably one of the hardest books that I have read, as it touches upon so many areas of myself that I am uncertain, unsettled about.

A chapter I am stuck on for days - Chapter 11: aimlessness:

‘There is A Buddhist teaching that might seem strange to you. This is the teaching of aimlessness. Aimlessness means not setting an object or goal in front of you and running after it… We must bring about a revolution in our thinking: we must stop. We must do as the flower does.  

The flower is aware of the fact that it contains everything within it, the whole cosmos, and it does not try to become something else. It is the same for you.  You have God within you, so you do not have to look for God. ‘

It is sort of ironic that my Chinese name carries or rather I always associate my name at birth to a flower that grows often at the hedges, yet I am unable to enter into the state of a flower.

It feels that the chapter is about contentment, peace, and the sense of feeling deeply rooted and grounded, none of which I feel I contain, not deeply at least. I am like a newly routed flower in the shallow water of the sea; the ebb and flow of the sea makes me vulnerable albeit I so much prefer to be by the sea.

The Aimlessness ( apranihita in Sanskrit) made me reflect into my inner self about the values that I thought upheld dear and high, and the roots of being that I thought I had strong and sturdy in me.  By searching for the stillness of the mind and the inner quest for a deep and meaningful living, I come to encounter that my roots of being are not deeply routed after all which make me fear  -- the same feeling how my art mentor made me experience early this year.

Marina Abramovic, in her Walk Through Walls, talked deeply about fear and pain and how, in the act of performance, how fear helped her overcome the limit of her being and propel her performance into a new being that connects herself, the art deeply with the audience.  

I hope Your True Home will do the same for me.