Have you ever stood on the top of a very high cliff and looked out across the vast ocean, watched the birds soaring below you and the waves crashing further below them?
Then have you taken a boat out and paddled beneath those very cliffs and seen the sights from this opposite angle?
Whenever we think we know something, we should turn the thing on its head and examine it from another viewpoint. If we do this, we will see that we never really know anything, but that not knowing is better than believing we do know.
If we sit zazen for one hour, we may feel our knees complain and our back ache. A foot may go dead or drowsiness may overcome us. The hour can seem a long time, seem to pass slowly.
If we go on holiday for one hour, that hour seems like a drop in the ocean, passing quickly and all of a sudden we are home again.
Perspective is everything.
It is said that when we grieve time passes too slowly, yet when we are having a joyful time, it can seem to fly by.
It is not time that changes, it is ourselves.
Change is inevitable and should be embraced as a chance to explore life, live life, live in the moment and relish it, as the very next moment will always be different.
Zen musings 