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This passage is a wonderful invitation to revisit a state of gratefulness that has no particular reason or cause in the outside world. So grateful for that! As for places with a vibe, it reminds me of my recent visit to the Ramakrishna Mission in Mumbai earlier this year. My family used to visit it 50 years ago, when it was surrounded by natural park-like setting. Now it is a smallish compound that is home to a serene temple (albiet with melodious kirtans happening in the evening) and an ashrama surrounded by very tall apartments all around it. Of course, with the accompanying traffic from the dense community of people. Despite the obvious change in the experience of getting to it and the ambiance of it, I experienced a becalming effect that made me realize that it is still a sanctuary! The ending of the passage made me think of the incantation "Aum" (often spelt as Om), which I recognize as an invitation to just BE in the Universe, void of anything that has a state -- the sound of nothing or indeed, everything! A U M . . .

Reminds me of something I read somewhere (I do not recall where): “Why is happiness so elusive?” “Because you look for it in the future instead of the present.”

Intriguing. As a parent of kids in college, I think of their "going away" to college as a means for our children to get to know their true selves. That is, if the parents have not already conditioned them to think of that education as a means to get a diploma that enables them to start earning the big bucks, but I digress . . . The discovery (if it is to happen) is often about shedding light on the misperceptions that may be occluding their experience of their true self. I submit that this parable/story is not so much about the eagle getting to know it's true nature. It is more about how the Body+Mind can be convinced of what reality is based on the perceptions that have nothing to do with the reality. The Naturalist helped correct the eagle's misperception of its avatar.

Radical acceptance is the way to experience the present moment, whether one is ailing or “charging forward towards some mountain-top”. It is the resistance to reality that causes one to suffer, whether it is due to an attachment/clinging or an aversion. A few years ago, I suffered with postherpetic neuralgia after a bout of shingles. And then, I came to accept the pain as my reality and did away with wishing it to stop (with drugs and therapies), and soon after, the suffering ended even as the pain lingered on.

I was once blessed to be the leader of an engineering team at a robotics company where we had to invent things that simply did not exist. And getting a couple of PhD candidates from the best robotics institute along with a mechanical engineer who liked to tinker with things that move, a scientist from SRI who had dedicated his life to geometric challenges for moving robots, a field expert in computer vision, and a couple of breadth-oriented engineers got together to tackle coming up with an accurate distance sensor that ended up costing about 1% of what was available in the market. The first couple of months were really hard because each person in the team was a rock star in their own expertise, and creating an environment where every one was heard and constructively challenged took a bit of time. But once there was a mutual respect for the unique perspective that each person (cell/tree) possessed, the collective energy truly manifested wisdom beyond that of any of us!

Great question, Anne Marie! I posit that it has taken a LONG time for the leaders to become who and what they are and therefore, how they behave. Even if they start practicing insightful meditation, it will take some amount of time before all of that can be undone, so an important component of being at peace might be the patience for all of that to play out.

I believe that the subtlety is in "achieving" peace by the way of one's being. Mindful living that is not subservient to the five senses goes a long way towards such a state of being, and if we can all achieve that, then the outer peace can be achieved. The "all" can mean you and the Other(s), depending on the context of the situation. To me, it is a passage about how to BE, not so much about what to DO. That said, a way of living consistent with what is prescribed in the last paragraph might go a long way towards helping one achieve that state of BEING.

Love it! One can practice conscious listening to that which is as authentic as it gets!

What a wonderfully articulated invitation to BE in the present! Not get caught up in DOING the cravings and aversions in thoughts, speech, or actions. I feel inspired to sit and practice being the witness right now . . .

Absence makes a heart grow fonder, no :-)? Very astute of Nasrudin . . . In the end, whether the ring is on the finger or not, what matters is whether the mind is attentive to its presence or absence. If one needs to see the ring to trigger the memory, what is that feeling one feels. Compare that with the feeling that surfaces or wells up from the actual recollection of a memory. I think it is like comparing apples and oranges. Also -- when one actually experiences an occasion with all the senses present, that is a much richer experience than when is busy recording or snapping it for sharing with those not present or for future "recollection". The images have their value, but they come at the price of the capturer's presence.

After the rich discussion on this passage at last night’s Circle, I came across this intriguing Ted Talk about a different perspective on the subject. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYp5XuGYqqY&t=38s

The book seems quite intriguing. I hope that we can have it translated or summarized in English. Thank you!

A wonderful poem/prayer for cultivating mindfulness about our oneness. May we all learn to remember well.

 Nicely articulated article and the responses to-date.  Special thanks to Ashish for posting the link to the emotinalcompetency site.  I found that article very useful in improving my understanding.