“Last night, as I was sleeping,
I dream’t—-marvelous error!—-
That I had a beehive
Here inside my heart.
And the golden bees Were making white combs
And sweet honey
From my old failures”
Antonio Machodo

On my birthday today I will focus on these reminders

1. Maintain an awareness of the preciousness of human life.  Beginning to realize how precious life is becomes one of the most powerful tools. It’s like gratitude… once you have this feeling of gratitude for your own life and the preciousness of human birth, then it takes you into any realm.

2.  Be aware of the reality that life ends; death comes for everyone. Life is very brief. If you realize that you don’t have that many more years to live and if if you live your life as if you actually had only a day left, then the sense of impermanence heightens that feeling of preciousness and gratitude.

3.  Recall that whatever you do, whether virtuous or not, has a result; what goes around comes around. The law of karma is that we sow the seeds and we reap the fruit.  So when you find yourself in a dark place… you can think, “Maybe it’s a time to get a little golden spade and dig myself out of this place.”

4.  Contemplate tat as long as you are to focused on self-importance and too caught up in thinking about how good or bad you are, you will suffer. Obsessing about getting what you wantand avoiding what you don’t want does not result in happiness.

Penna Chodron