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I am impressed with the insights that come when someone combines meditation with hospice work. Listen to what Rodney Smith has realized with regards to time:

With death, we have no more time to procrastinate. No more endless tomorrows. Time comes screeching to a halt, and suddenly the heart opens. Why does the heart open when time isn't there? Thinking in terms of time, living in terms of time is the very blockage of the heart." (emphasis added)

Living in terms of time is the very blockage of the heart. Ah, this is so true! Of course, it is thought that creates the big cage of time. Time didn't create itself; it is the product of the thinking mind, whose sole existence is the establishment of safety or security. We spend our entire lives searching for a refuge, not just from life's hardships, but from life's built-in atomic bomb; that is, death. But, there is no bunker to retreat to; time cannot take us to eternity, at least not by means of thought. So, we only end up living like a refugee, like a fugitive... constantly on the run. It's not until we truly face our mortality, once and for all, that we free ourselves to living. This is why Rodney says, at the end of his interview with author Victoria Jean Dimidjian in JOURNEYING EAST, "When we keep our death close, we remain in touch with how to live." Yes, but this can only be done, unself-consciously, that is, without a self, without a director. And, I probably should add, there is no "how."

trail head
trail's end
that butterfly