Diary

"the meditation teacher said:

"The breath of life is given us as a gift. As is life itself. And we know it is a gift because we cannot hold onto it. We have to let it go..."

"When we are trapped in the prison of the ego we lose the capacity to gaze."

"In meditating we learn better how to love".

... And that's enough wisdom for one day. He's a quiet, unassuming man, is Father Laurence Freeman of the WCCM (http://wccm.org/) who doesn't look or sound like an important  spiritual leader. But I've a feeling that's what he is.

He speaks very simply of the effect of meditation on primary school children in East Kilbride, of the inmates of the women's prison in Australia who also meditate and pledged to raise a hundred dollars towards a scholarship fund to allow people on low income to go the Movement's new meditation centre in France. A place some of them will never be let out to see....

I jotted down some of his words in a random kind of way, because they are really worth hearing, but I suspect the real gift he brings cannot be expressed in words.

He's one of these people it's a huge privilege to be with, somehow. I can't claim I had a particularly profound experience when we were meditating. But I left with a kind of glow in my heart. I said goodbye to a fellow participant and she looked at me and said, "I feel a great hope. There is hope isn't there?"

We smiled at each other. Yes, there is.