Lotus of the Heart > Path of Spirit > Appreciaton and Joy

 
 

Appreciation... Loving the Inner of Things

Jun 26, 2021

Saying For Today: Yet, in seeing arises appreciation... a sign of joy arising from loving the inner of things.


White Daisy...

White Daisy... "Day's Eye"

Appreciation, from Latin "to set at a price, appraise."

In modern societies, we are conditioned not to appreciate. Runaway capitalism, for example, cares not that you appreciate a single thing. And does not advertising consist of persons trained to deliver the message that what we now have is not enough. Always being pulled toward something else, we cannot rightly value what is. We become ruled by greed; we forfeit gratitude. Where is the joy in that? Should we be surprised that with capitalism comes widespread misery - not for capitalism itself is in error, but in its use for greed, not creating a society characterized by gratitude?

This pervasive pursuit of more is like enjoying a meal, but one ends up bloated and with heartburn after not stopping at enough. Who can blame the food? No one. At a certain point, we lose the enjoyment of things - for all things are here to be means of joy -, and rather than causes of joy, those things become sources of pain. In trying to remedy the discontent by accumulating more things, we increase the dissatisfaction.

Indeed, the potential of things to bring joy, anyway, is not in the things. So, our greed for more is rooted first in our loss of connection with the Source of things and the joy they bring us.

There is nothing wrong with more. But we are never content when more is more important than less, and when things are more important than Where things come from. In appreciation, we see and receive all as a gift.

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John Butler. Wonders of Spiritual Unfoldment.

I escaped for a bit of air and exercise, walking in a dingy alley near the Westminster rubbish carts' depot. It was dark, cold, raining - an evening conducive to depression. I looked down and saw in the light of a street lamp, a cigarette packet crushed into the gutter. My God, how beautiful it was, how perfectly it lay there, reflecting all the lawfulness of life. How the colour, the water and the marks of tyres radiated their message to me, the town hater and despiser of civilisation, that God lay as surely in that humble sign, as ever He sang in the skylarks overhead at home. My heart soared, and burst out "Oh, I am in love!"

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Thomas Traherne. Centuries of Meditation.

Some things are little on the outside, and rough and common, but I remember the time when the dust of the streets were as pleasing as Gold to my infant eyes, and now they are more precious to the eye of reason.

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How can we appreciate what is present, when we do not see it? That is, do we see it as it is in itself, not as we have been told it is? If we do not take the time to see it as more than its appearance, how can we rightly esteem it? Suppose we are too busy to stop and see. Then, how can we appreciate what is already present for us to be gratified with, while we rush on to the next thing, hungering for more... seeking satisfaction, so living unsatisfied? Yet, in seeing arises appreciation... a sign of joy arising from loving the inner of things. So, in rightly appreciating something, we appraise its price, which means priceless, for no one can name a price for the pricelessness of anything.

Yet, the eyes only see this, when the heart sees this. And one does not have to see with the eyes to see this. So, do not try to see, or you will not see. If one does not see now, it is for that one thinks he or she sees now. Let seeing arise of itself in union with the seen; then, will appear appreciation and its joy.

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*© Brian K. Wilcox, 2021

*Brian's book, An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love, can be ordered through major online booksellers or the publisher AuthorHouse. The book is a collection of poems based on wisdom traditions, predominantly Christian, Buddhist, and Sufi, with extensive notes on the poetry's teachings and imagery.

 

Lotus of the Heart > Path of Spirit > Appreciaton and Joy

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