TAKING STOCK

So here it is, the beginning of a new week, without the need to actually DO anything. Oh, there's the taxes, of course. There's the car that needs to go in for maintenance. There's the long, 10,000 text just completed in final draft form for the Davyd Whaley Foundation (more of that to come.) It's off to my proofreader, now, for a proper edit. I've always hated the chore of footnotes and the rest of the formal necessities. Oh, and yes, I want to get back to the gym, having missed the past couple of weeks almost entirely. I need to regenerate some energy.

It has been a, well, challenging time. If I recount the list, it's not in search of sympathy nor, I hope, a way of feeling sorry for myself. But TBD readers will know that the main concern of this blog is (see above) "getting to the heart of the matter"--even, perhaps especially, when that matter is myself. My prime intention is self-reflection, a kind of interested observation of this thing, this body-mind entity I'm sufficiently deluded to call my "self"!

And the body part of that entity has been showing the wear and tear. There are, for example, a couple of spots on my face that have been diagnosed as cancerous (though not dangerously so!) I go to the hospital next week for very minor surgery. Then there's a second "nodule" on the lung--again, no cause for alarm, they say, but for a reformed smoker, the lung is never something to be taken lightly. I go in (next week!) for a pulmonary test. And the head? I'm scheduled (next week!) for an MRI. Did I mention that I've had a nasty cold?

So, I have the prospect of a busy week at the HMO...  I'm thankful for the measure of equanimity I've learned in the course of now more than twenty years of daily meditation practice. And looking forward to a quiet week without anything to actually DO, except to find that inner place of equanimity and restore the somewhat battered spirits. I'm glad--and privileged!--to have the basic equipment for the task.

From that place of gratitude, I'm happy to send out thoughts of goodwill to all my Buddha Diaries friends.