Monday, October 13th, 2014

Val-des-Roches, Quebec

Thank Your Shapers


It being Thanksgiving Day, we can consider a day to express gratitude.  “For what?” you may ask.  For at least what has come to you today, because the task to say merci beaucoup to all the nice people that have come to your life would be impossible.  Consider, however, that whatever has come to you as good or bad circumstances, are all welcome, because they shape us all.  Thank the shapers and love who you are.

I decided to be grateful for the people in my presence today, and the environment of today.  I decided to BE HERE NOW.  After hummous and toast sandwich, I took to a trail which might lead me to where the other three monk had apparently slipped off to.  I wanted to relay to them my thanks to them about the good company they provide. 

Well, I never did detect them.  No foot tracks or evidence of their wanderings were clues for me.  I then took to one of dozens of trails.  I stepped by moose hoof prints and felt the animal’s spirit.  I spotted a grouse, a chipmunk, and felt their presence.  Even so, I heard the woodpecker tapping his tree and viewed the green moss and the white of the peeling birch.  The smell of the spruce spurred me on.  All this was my company and I said, “Hare Krishna,” as a way to express thanks. 

The footpath was the way I like it.  It was sloping up and down and sideways.  There were areas of moistness and dryness, of sand and black soil, of laden twigs, leaves, bark and rock.  The path was an ankle strengthener and an eye alerter.  I was grateful even though I could not find the lost monks. 

It’s all quite relative, isn’t it?  Perhaps I’ve become the lost monk.  Let’s take this as a metaphor on life and when on the spiritual path, there must always be a sense of direction, and even more so, a sense of gratitude.

Thus ends the walk for today, and the super meetings of the weekend.  En route to Montreal’s airport, my auto companions, Sahadeva, Vrinda, and Gauramani and I, spent the hour pulling out the highlights of three days.  It was so fitting considering the day.

May the Source be with you!

6 KM