As It Is

Yesterday I cooked a pot of pumpkin soup. My husband said it tasted a bit strange. I asked him what he meant by strange? He said it was tasteless. I told him that I cooked the same soup last year for a zen nun. She asked what I have put in for such a tasty pumpkin soup. My soup consisted of only pumpkin, potatoes and water and nothing else. I laughed at him and said because the nun can taste the soup as it is, not as what it should be. We often hear, see and feel the world around us as it should be. This is how our suffering begins. For example when we taste the pumpkin soup, we expect it as a French or traditional English pumpkin soup. It has to be as smooth and creamy as silk with right seasonings. Unlike my hand mashed pumpkin soup without any seasoning. We can use this analogy in parenting. Parents often have a set standard for their children. If their children are not up to their standards or expectations then they suffer. Parents are not the only ones who suffer their children are also the victims. As a parent why can't we accept our children as who they are? In most cases we are not able to accept our appearance, job, family, status in the society, etc, etc. Why should we match them/us with what the world has set for them/us?

All troubles begin with us not accepting things as they are. This is a very important factor in finding our inner peace and happiness if we can accept the phenomena as it is. To practise this we don't judge when our five senses come into contact with the outside world. For example our eyes see objects and we just see them as they are. Our mind has no judgement/comment on objects that we see. This applies to our hearing and touching/feeling senses. If we can do this then we see/hear/feel the world around us objectively. We give ourselves and the phenomena a fair go. Let's go back to the pumpkin soup example. We can taste the real taste of the pumpkin and potato, not the past pumpkin soup nor the future pumpkin soup. In this we make peace with ourselves as we enjoy our lives right here and now.