Opening the Windows

Yesterday finches were singing over the sunflowers in the back yard. They also came to sample the red yew berries and one left a translucent feather on the porch. I was glad the windows were open – otherwise I would have missed their songs.

If we let go of our thoughts, these small happenings have room to enter with their surprise and joy. Keeping the windows of our minds and hearts open allows old, stale thoughts to leave and new, amazing ones to enter like translucent feathers from finches’ wings.

We often close the windows, shutting out new, fresh thoughts with more oxygen, thinking we have what we need. After all, the air outside is cold in October. We leave ourselves with only our stale ideas, which become even more stale as we continue to think them. They lose oxygen – the ability to help us be flexible and grow – as we breathe them into our minds over and over. Breathing the stale, low-oxygen air of our old ideas, we become dull and confused, angry and judgmental.

Being in my seventies, I have many stale thoughts about etiquette and attire. I’m often judgmental of what younger women wear these days. Forgetting that my wardrobe in the sixties was just as shocking to my elders, I raise my eyebrows in the line at the post office when there are legging-covered rears ahead of me. It’s even worse if there are also tight tank tops over protruding flesh. Perhaps it would be useful if I opened the window and let my stuffy thoughts out and let in some new ones with more oxygen. Some that are fresh and flexible. They might be cold and uncomfortable at first, but they would wake me up and make me grow. I could begin by asking why younger women think that showing their butts and bellies is a good idea. The answer might be surprising and enlightening. After all, we had reasons for wearing the miniskirts, hip-hugging bell bottoms, and crop tops we wore in the sixties. That miniskirt didn’t always hide my rear, either. I pretended it did, though.

We’re a lot more content, too, if we open the windows of our minds and hearts. The judgment, frustration, and anger that come from holding onto – constantly breathing – old, stale ideas isn’t pleasant . Those ideas make our spirits heavy and dull, and they pull us into doing things we regret.  This is exactly what Shakyamuni Buddha called dukkha and what we call “suffering.” Let’s let all those things go out and let reality in.

Then let’s make sure we don’t close the windows again and let things get stuffy and dull our thinking again. In the Pali Canon, Shakyamuni Buddha called this “guarding the doors of the senses.”

Fall is here. When we open the windows of our homes to let in fresh air and finch song, we can remember to open the windows of our hearts and minds, too.