Rhea is writing today: When I was at school (just a “few” years ago) they made us read “the classics” and all through those years I did all I could to avoid reading those books which I assumed were boring. When I had to do exams about such books, I would read shortened versions or borrow notes from some swottier friend. Not sure what’s happening now as I approach my sixties but suddenly I’m discovering why they were called “classics”… So here we go, I now quote Ernest Hemmingway and his character Richard Jordan in “For whom the bell tolls”. These words are clearly all the more poignant if you read them in context.
But in the meantime all the life you have or ever will have is today, tonight, tomorrow, today, tonight, tomorrow, over and over again (I hope), he thought and so you had better take what time there is and be very thankful for it.
… that is all your whole life is: now. There is nothing else than now. There is neither yesterday, certainly, nor is there any tomorrow. How old must you be before you know that? There is only now, and if now is only two days, then two days is your life and everything in it will be in proportion. This is how you live a life in two days. And if you stop complaining and asking for what you never will get, you will have a good life. A good life is not measured by any biblical span. So now do not worry, take what you have, and do your work and you will have a long life and a very merry one.
In our last retreat Diana reminded us of the following words by the Dalai Lama:
There are only two days in the year when nothing can be done: one is called yesterday, and the other – tomorrow.
