Trust in Sangha

I want to post today, but I need to make it short and quick. I am a writer by profession as well as avocation and temperament, and today I have a deadline to meet. Revision as practice -- now that is an idea worth exploring. (Or, procrastination as practice, maybe?) But not today, not here.

So I am posting one of my favorite passages from Thay, about the role of Sangha. Thay has said that of the three jewels, the most important is Sangha. His is truly the bodhisatva vision -- I am within you, and you are within me. We go nowhere alone.

When we are in a Sangha,
we are like a drop of water in a river.
We allow the Sangha to hold us and transport us.
Don’t be like a drop of oil in the river,
not mixing with the other drops of water --
that way you arrive nowhere.
Allow yourself to be transported by the Sangha
so that your pain, sorrow, and suffering
are recognized and embraced.

You have to trust the Sangha.
Imagine you are a drop of water
that would like to go to the ocean.
If you go alone, you might evaporate,
but if you allow yourself to be
embraced and transported by the Sangha,
then you will get there.
You suffer only when you are a separate drop of water.

Please remember this.

 painting: River Run by Devon Featherstone

Devon Featherstone is an award-winning, self-taught artist based in British Columbia. Click here to contact her about works available for purchase. 

[Quotation from Peace Begins Here. The line breaks are mine.]