Pleasant and Unpleasant

I drove 40 minutes to the county jail yesterday to teach a weekly meditation group on the women's block. I arrived to find the unit on lockdown, so I had to leave.

To assuage my disappointment, I stopped at the farm and garden store. I was looking for onions because a few friends have told me they've already planted their onions. I found fat bunches of Spanish onion seedlings and elsewhere I found 4-packs of Walla Wallas--a big, sweet, onion-ring type onion. 

But the item that got my attention was the potted tulips on sale for half price. I bought 2 pots of white tulips, and 3 pots of pink tulips. Oh, the front step looks so much better.

Did you notice what i did?

I felt disappointment.. Unpleasant.

Driving 40 minutes, "for nothing."  Unpleasant.

Without really paying attention, I shifted my internal thermostat (and maybe yours?) to pleasant by stopping to buy onion seedlings.

I saw tulips. Pleasant.

On sale! Pleasant.

I bought tulips. Pleasant.

Unpleasant does not equal "bad." Unpleasant is simply unpleasant.

Pleasant does not equal "good." Pleasant is simply pleasant.

This simple meditation on pleasant and unpleasant focuses our attention on the motivation behind desire. (I don't want to feel unpleasant. Unpleasant feels unpleasant. I want to feel pleasant.)

I showed up at the jail and greeted 2 of the inmates. Pleasant.

I showed up for them. Pleasant.

Those women in orange pants are locked up with their minds. Now that is truly unpleasant. They need all the stress reduction they can get. Even if it is only knowing that one person showed up for them.

Little Spring Bulbs

They say animals return to places where they have previously found food. Bears will return to your compost pile. I can vouch that raccoons and squirrels return to the birdfeeder.

Myself? I return to the garden center to buy a few more winter bulbs to pot up. I'm done with Dutch tulips. I've found one nursery that still has a supply of small bulbs--scilla, puschkinia, and those dwarf Turkish tulips that i love.

This shopping for bulbs has all the hallmarks of craving: I plan where and when i'm going to the garden center days in advance; I make sure i have enough time to stop, that i'm not in a hurry; I buy just a few packages of bulbs, trying to fool myself into thinking i have control over the situation.

Oh, i have a wonderful rationale, which my mind just latched on to: If i plant these bulbs in pots, then i can put them exactly where i want them in the spring. You have to admit: that's a very good rationalization.

I am craving spring flowers.

Simply notice that.

Puschkinia and Scilla (Siberian squill)

Tulip violacea

Dirt in the Trunk

Now is the season to make the last trip to the nursery or garden center to buy those perennials or shrubs that can hardly wait to shrug off their containers, like a coat grown too small.

Great deals are there for the spending, under the disguise of "Save 50%." We could save 100% by not buying anything, but desire trumps logic any day.

So we load plants into the trunk of our car, maybe overflowing onto the floor of the back seat. Some women carry the protection of an old shower curtain or an old rug, but i always was an au-naturel girl. After i arrive home and unload, crumbs of dirt and a dead leaf or two remind me day after day, week after week to clean up after myself.

Desire is the culprit that weakens our integrity, that pushes us to tell a white lie, to fudge a bit, to keep the incorrect change that is given, to kill pests because we hate them, to drink one too many glasses of wine.

Our conscience knows. Our conscience has the integrity to notice our crummy behavior. But we throw those thoughts into the trunks of our mind and try not to notice.

When we finally get around to cleaning up our act, we feel so much better. Ahhh. We can breathe again.