When our life takes a turn for the worse, when we start encountering cracks in the ice, what do we do? We try to clean up the surface, making our usual efforts to push away or overcome the difficulties. Or we might try to skate around the cracks by ignoring or suppressing our reactions to unpleasant events. In an attempt to keep from falling through the cracks in the ice, we choose our strategy, either working harder at maintaining control of our lives or making misguided attempts to escape from our difficulties with diversions, pleasures, or busyness. Rarely do we question our strategies, which are always rooted in fear. We believe in them as the unquestioned truth. Yet in doing so, we define our own boundaries, our own restrictions. Consequently our life narrows down to a sense of vague dissatisfaction.
Excerpted from: Being Zen: Bringing Meditation to Life By Ezra Bayda
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