If I had but one prayer

The mind is like a crazy monkey, which leaps about and never stays in one place. It is completely restless and constantly paranoid about its surroundings. From "Trapping hte Monkey" in THE TEACUP AND THE SKULLCUP: CHOGYAM TRUNGPA ON ZEN AND TANTRA.
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Lying in bed, 'doing nothing', is a great opportunity to reflect, and to 'do nothing'. At least, it would be a great time for such indulgence if my monkey mind didn't keep interfering.

"Don't be so lazy. Get busy." Its voice whispers with a sibilant hiss oozing like steam seeping from a lumbering volcano.

The more rational part of me leaps in to defend my indolence. "Get busy doing what? Not much I can do hobbling around on crutches."

But still the monkey mind persists. "There's gotta be something you can do. Quit lying there feeling sorry for yourself. Nobody likes a lazy person."

Ahhh, the power of the monkey mind to disturb peace of mind and tranquility.

My lovely friend CW wrote me today and offered up a quote from Buddha, “Patience is the greatest prayer.”

If I had one prayer, it would be, "Thank you."

Perhaps gratitude is the most powerful force for healing.

As I lay in my bed I whisper to the birds at the feeder, "Thank you for brightening my day. Thank you for your song. Your lithesome spirit. Your twittering verse."

I look up through the green leaves of the birch and apple trees to the blue sky beyond and whisper, "Thank you for your shade. Your whispering leaves. Your beauty."

Gratitude.

To fall into prayer I must surrender my ego's need to justify my existence -- my state of doing nothing, as well as my state of doing 'busy'. To surrender, I must release my need to feel that everything I do matters. As my daughter Alexis recently wrote on her blog, "I am nothing. And everything... I do not matter. And yet, I am matter, so I must."

I must surrender my need to matter enough that my matter becomes all that matters to me. When I matter enough to cherish the goodness in my being me, to respond from my highest good, no matter the weather, the time of day or night, or the circumstances surrounding me, then I will have fallen into that place where all that matters is -- the moment in which I breathe.

I move into gratitude, the gateway to patience. If I had but one prayer, let it be, Thank you.

The question is: Have you prayed today?