Meeting Life. . .
Autumn has a way of making change impossible to ignore.
A tree that was deep green only weeks ago begins turning gold and crimson. Morning arrives a little later. Shadows stretch differently across the ground. The air carries the first suggestion of colder days ahead.
Buddhism calls this truth anicca, or impermanence.
Everything conditioned changes. Our bodies change. Relationships change. Circumstances change. Opinions change. Even the person we believe ourselves to be is continually being shaped by experience.
Yet we often live as though permanence were possible.
We want good moments to remain. We want people to stay exactly as we know them. We want our bodies to continue behaving as they once did. We build expectations around tomorrow and become frustrated when life edits the script.
But impermanence is not a flaw in life.
It is life.
Imagine a world where nothing changed. There would be no growth, healing, learning, forgiveness, recovery, or new beginnings. A difficult moment would remain difficult forever. A mistake could never become wisdom.
Change takes things from us, but change also makes transformation possible.
The autumn leaf understands something we often forget. Its beauty does not depend upon remaining green. There is beauty in becoming something different.
Our practice, then, is not to defeat change. It is to become more comfortable moving alongside it.
Today, notice something changing around you.
Perhaps it is the season. Perhaps your neighborhood looks different. Perhaps your body feels different than it did five years ago. Perhaps your priorities have shifted.
Instead of immediately judging the change as good or bad, simply recognize it:
This too is changing.
There is enormous freedom in those few words.
When we stop demanding permanence from an impermanent world, we begin meeting life where it actually exists: here, now, moving.
The seasons do not ask permission to change.
Neither does life.
Our task is not to stop the turning of the seasons, but to become awake enough to appreciate each one while it is here.
Peace and Love, Jim
#meeting_life #thedailybuddha #tdb
