Finding Beauty In the Mud

There was an ancient Tantric teacher names Adhi Shankara.  One of the many contributions that he offered to our lineage of Tantra is The Five Noble Truths, beliefs that can help change one’s inner world which will then ripple positively into the outer world. In the madness that is erupting from this election season mixed with the global concerns, it is really easy to just see things as terrible and only getting worse.
This is when the tools of Tantra really help. I offer one of the Five Truths which I find especially useful in these times:

The world is beautiful because it is a manifestation
of the Most Beautiful One.
There is beauty, even in the most of troubling times.

Try this.  Try the task of looking for beauty, even in the difficult boss, the terrible traffic, the limited bank account.  At first you will want to scoff at me and throw this suggestion away. I lovingly challenge you for most of us have grown and developed some of our best qualities through the difficult times.  We often have to look very hard for beauty because our eyes and perspective are not developed to see it.  Once we start to see the opportunity to connect to a kind person as a result of being late, the new skill of patience developed from a bad boss, or even the chance to become closer to someone after an argument, the more we look for this, the more we see it all the time.

I leave you with this offering as we move into the cozy Fall season.  No matter what unfolds in our future, we have the capacity to create beauty and positive change It starts one step at a time.

Blessings and love,
Jeanne