Same Old Thing, Made New

I've just cooked up the last of the beets from the garden into a delicious borscht. This week, i will finish off the carrots (that the chipmunks didn't eat). I have a few more potatoes, a few more onions, lots of garlic, and enough butternut squash for the winter.

Localvoring is actually hard work. The other morning, at meditation at my neighbor Connie's, i watched her chop fresh CSA vegetables into a miso soup. I'd like cabbage and collards for a change. I'm tired of carrots and beets. I'm almost tired of pesto too, but not yet.

Yeah, sometimes we get tired of our meditation practice. Same thing, day after day.

This is when we need to bring energy and interest to our practice.

I particularly like this quality in one of my teachers, Shinzen Young. Even when i go to monthly retreats with him, and he's teaching the same thing year after year, he always has a new angle on it. A new way to look at the same thing he's been saying for years.

Thich Nhat Hanh, who has authored more than 100 books, also always has a fresh way to teach meditation. He's in his late 80s, so he's been nourishing his students with the same thing now for decades.

Okay. Time to get back to those carrots. Do you have a new recipe for me?

Photo from pbs.org