For every worry

or hurt that chews at your mind,

think of one thing you’re grateful for, however small.

One by one, fill your mind with them. Let them

crowd out the worry and the hurt.

Keep moving.

 

Maggie Smith

(see also)

 

THE HON. ROBERT NESTA MARLEY, O.M.
February 6, 1945 – May 11, 1981

Born fatherless, never knew my father.
My mother worked. She didn’t have no way of
keeping me going to school. We don’t have
education, we have inspiration. If I was
educated, I would be a damn fool.

Me don’t have no prejudice about myself.
Why me don’t have no prejudice about myself?
My father was white, my mother black. You know,
dem call me half-caste, or whatever. Well, me don’t
be upon nobody’s side. Me don’t be upon black mon’s side
nor white man’s side but upon God’s side, de mon
who create me, who cause me to come
from black and white.

Reggae music is the the people’s music, reggae music is news.
It’s news about your own self, your own history, things that
they wouldn’t teach you in a school. Reggae music is a
music created by Rasta people. And it carry earth
force, a people rhythm, earth people. You know,
there’s a rhythm of people working,
people moving.

Dreads of the world suffer.
Masses of the people suffer.
And dis music come from the
masses of the people.

Why one race want to be rich and the other one poor?
Why one want to fight on the other? It’s no more of that.
The youth of today say no, that cannot work no more.

How long have I been a Rastafarian?
I am a Rastamon, you know, I stand Rasta.
To say how long is like, again, I say, from Creation,
if you can overstand it that way. Because y’all like
to say 15 years, 10 years, it’s not really so.
It’s from Creation.

The only law which is law is the law of life,
the law of how to live. Me don’t want to get
involved in talking like me is a politician.
Me just want to talk about righteousness.
Jah is Earth’s rightful ruler.

I don’t come to bow, you know, I come to conquer.
I don’t come to bow, I come to conquer.

My home is always where I am. My home is in my head.
My home is what I think about, how I try to settle my mind.
That is my home. My home is not in the material world but there.

I don’t really have no ambition, you know.
I only have one thing I’d really like to see happen.
I’d like to see mankind live together — black, white,
shiny, anyone, you know what I mean? That’s all.

We are revolutionaries.
Me see myself as a revolutionary,
who don’t have no help, nor take no bribe
from no one, but fight it single
handed, with music.

My life is important to me,
but all people life is important.
My life is only important if me can
help plenty people. If my life is just for
me, my own security, then me no want it.
My life is for people. That’s the way me is.

I say to the people that they have a voice inside of
them that talk to them, you know. That is the voice
that people must listen to. Because in everything
that you go and do, there is a wrong way and a
right way. And if you listen good, you will
know the right way. You know? Because
there is a voice inside talkin’ to
everyone. Seen? Seen.

Jah lives, children!

this was rory young

 

As good a man

as I have ever known or am likely to

is being laid to rest by his close family and friends

today in the Netherlands. Please send 

them all a tray of light.

 

🐘

 

Prayers for the dead

are on the same footing as gifts for the living.

The angel goes in to the dead with a tray of light, bearing a cloth of light,

and says, ‘This is a gift for you from your brother so-and-so,

from your relative so-and-so.” And he delights in

it just as a living man rejoices

in a gift.

 

Ibn al -Ghazali

 

🕊

 

please donate to the Rory Young Family Memorial Fund

 

 

In your light

I learn how to love.

In your beauty, how to make poems.

You dance inside my chest, where no one sees you,

but sometimes I do, and that sight

becomes this art.

 

Rumi

 

As you continue to practise, please understand: there is nothing to worry about. Establish this feeling of being relaxed and unworried, securely, in the mind. Once the mind is concentrated and one-pointed, no mind-object will be able to penetrate or disturb it, and you will be able to sit in the meditation posture for as long as you want. You will also be able to sustain concentration without any feelings of pain and discomfort.

Having developed samadhi to this level, you will be able to enter or leave it at will. When you leave it, it will be at your convenience. You simply withdraw at your ease, rather than because you are feeling lazy or tired. You withdraw from samadhi because it is the appropriate time to withdraw from it, and you come out of it at your will.

You enter and leave this samadhi without any problems. The mind and heart are at ease. If you genuinely have samadhi like this, it means that sitting meditation and entering samadhi for just thirty minutes or an hour will enable you to remain cool and peaceful for many days afterwards. Experiencing the effects of samadhi like this for several days has a purifying effect on the mind. Whatever you experience will become an object for contemplation. This is where the practice really begins. It is the fruit which arises as samadhi matures.

 

Ajahn Chah