Risk Revival

Beauty
Even on the road to hell, flowers can make you smile. They are fragile, ephemeral, and uncompromising. No one can alter their nature. Yes, you can easily destroy them, but you will not gain anything. You cannot force them to submit to your will. Flowers arouse in us an instinct to protect them, to appreciate them, and to shelter them. This world is too ugly, too violent. There should be something delicate to care about. To do so is to be lifted above the brute and to go toward the exquisite. When we offer flowers on our altar, we are offering a high gift. Money is too vulgar, food too pedestrian. Only flowers are unsullied. By offering them, we offer purity. The tenderness of flowers arouses mercy, compassion, and understanding. If that beauty is delicate, so much the better. Life itself is transient. We should take the time to appreciate beauty in the midst of temporality.
Soul
Why do people think that talk of the soul is so abstruse? They say that soul is hard to perceive, and they believe that spirituality is difficult to know in ordinary life. But we do talk of the soul all the time – “That song awakened something in my soul”, “It satisfied my soul”, “This place has a special soul”, “This person has a great deal of soul”. This shows that we have at least an intuitive sense of such a thing as soul. Even people who do not think of themselves as spiritually sentient have had experiences relating to the soul. We know it to be something subtle, special, transcendent, and apart from ordinary references of physical laws. We leave for others what we should do with the soul. Is that soul of yours subject to damnation, blessing, reincarnation, awakening, resurrection, rebirth, karma, or enlightenment? Or is that soul of yours just there? Isn’t it our deepest, most subtle humanity? Isn’t it a consciousness that can recognize, that can feel? That is gentle, not aggressive? That does not scheme, is not political, is not ambitious, and is not evil? Soul is a part of our everyday life.
Joy
In all this talk about spiritual devotion, there is one simple fact. You have to like it. It should make you happy. It is unfortunate that so much coercion, unhappiness, bitterness, guilt, and fear become wrapped up in spirituality. Why can’t we simply do thing out of joy? Practicing spirituality isn’t a matter of drudgery. It isn’t for fitting into a social group. It isn’t a matter of fear. It has nothing to do with status. Being devoted to holiness in your life is a matter of joy and celebration. When you sit down to meditate or pray, a smile should come to your lips and a feeling of joy should permeate your body. When you go to consecrated group to give thanks and celebrate, you should do so not because of the day of the week or out of the habit of ritual, but because this is the best way that you know how to adore your gods and express the wonder of being on this earth. Yes, there is much happiness in this existence. That unhappiness is part of the overall field of negativity. There are also positive things in life, and spirituality is foremost among them. So whenever we practice our spiritual devotion, let it be in gladness and joy.
Purity
We forget purity too much. We make compromises with our hygiene in the name of expediency. We allow our lands, mountains, valleys, seas, and oceans to be polluted for the sake of the market. We allow our minds to be sullied with frivolous entertainment. War is thought to be a viable option, principle is considered a negotiable quality, our children are victimized by strangers, and obscenity is considering a valid subject for art. Where is the purity in our lives? We get married. We get divorced. We don’t care whom we hurt in life. We think loyalty is a charming virtue but in our lives we treat it as if it is meaningless. We sacrifice the values of our youth and adolescence in order to buy unsound glory in our later years. Where is the purity in our lives? We think that if we can triumph in one golden moment, that will dissolve all other filth we preoccupy ourselves with. We uphold the greatness of athletes who want to have that one moment of triumph. We laud the battlefield hero as the redeemer of our guilt over the horror of war. We have spent much time fostering destructive emotions as a means of purity. Where is the purity in our lives? Seek purity. It may not be easy. It may not be common. But it is the one state that we can attain that is without compromise.
Healing
No matter how extreme a situation is, it will change. It cannot continue forever. Thus a great fire is always destined to burn itself out; a turbulent storm and sea will always become calm until its ferocity completely dissolves. Natural events balance themselves out by seeking their opposites, and this aspect of healing is the heart of all healing for all things. This process can take time. Small events require little balancing. But great and momentous events can take days, years, and lifetimes to return to a point of stability. In fact, without these slight imbalances in our lives, there can be no movement in life. Imbalances keep our lives changing. Total centering, total balance, would only be stasis. All life is continual destruction and healing, over and over again. That is why, even in the midst of an extreme situation, the wise are patient. Whether the situation is illness, calamity, anger, or the passing of a close friend or family member, the wise know that healing will follow upheaval.