Pema Chödrön

Um, so, you know, when I, again, when I tell people this, you know, they're, like, visibly relieved that they don't have to go and start looking at, you know, property outside of, you know, the major metropolises around the world, um, and, you know, learn how to work a generator and so on.

Um, but then they wanna know, well, what does work? Well, what does work is actually, and I love this, you know, phrase from Pema Chodron, which is start where you are.

Like, stay where you are in your suburban sort of setup with your cul-de-sac and so on, or in your apartment building, um, or in your small town, and actually start to really form bonds of communication and cooperation and community within a group that would probably naturally fit to 100 and, 150 people, 'cause this is, that is how we naturally operate.

And that is actually something we can all do now.

It's hard to, it's hard...

It's Pema Chödrön.

Okay.

I-

So I think, I think I know-- I mean, I know, I don't think.

I know that I have mentioned Pema Chödrön on this, um, podcast many times, and I, I even believe I've shared this before, but I'm gonna share it again 'cause it's very relevant.

This idea of getting unstuck, and she's got some work on getting unstuck, and she really says there's like three big steps to getting unstuck, and the first one is noticing.

Noticing that you're stuck.

Yeah.

He sent me this and it's from Pema Chodron.

So the Pema Chodron gave me a mala.

The Pema Chodron mala.

Wow.

And as I've been using it, attaching such a thing to the thing that's supposed to liberate me.

occurred to me naturally.

So every day I go to the river and I meditate, work the mala, and then afterwards, and malas you are supposed to treat as very sacred, keep them off the ground, you don't put them where people walk, you know, have a special place for them.

It's like we have these chapters of being in the flow and remembering who we are and feeling epically connected to God, and everything's working and clicking and, and then we have chapters where it feels like God left us on the tennis court, and we're, like, serving these balls, and it's like they- they're not getting returned, you know? And, and that is, that brings great suffering.

But the- they are the, the times, you know? It's like Pema Chödrön's book, When Things Fall Apart.

Things are falling apart so that they can rebuild back together, and what's rebuilding back together is the remembering of who you really are.

So things are falling apart.

And let's take a closer look.

OK, so the piece that I would ground us in, which again, very unconventional, is something that Pema Chodron wrote in her book, Uncomfortable with Uncertainty.

And there's a quote that I can read you from her book.

So she shares, as human beings, we share a tendency to scramble for certainty whenever we realize that everything around us is in flux.