Seeing things as they are

"In refusing to acknowledge how things actually are in any moment, perhaps because we don't want them to be that way, and in attempting to compel a situation or a relationship to be the way we want it to be out of fear that otherwise we may not get our needs met, we are forgetting that most of the time we hardly know what our own way really is; we only think we do. And we forget that this dance [of reciprocity and interdependence between self and world] is one of extraordinary complexity as well as simplicity, and that new and interesting things happen when we do not collapse in the presence of our fears, and instead stop imposing and start living our truth, well beyond our limited ability to assert tight control over anything for very long.

"As individuals and as a species, we can no longer afford to ignore this fundamental characteristic of our reciprocity and interconnectednes, nor can we ignore how interesting new possibilities emerge out of our yearnings and our intentions when we are, each on our own way, actually true to them, however mysterious and opaque they may at times feel to us. Through our sciences, through our philosophies, our histories, and our spiritual traditions, we have come to see that our health and our well-being as individuals, our happiness, and actually even the continuity of the germ line, that life stream that we are only a momentary bubble in, that way in which we are the life-givers and world-builders for our future generations, depend on how we choose to live our own lives while we have them to live."

(Jon Kabat-Zinn, Coming to Our Senses)