July 26, 2013

Before visiting the garden, Ginny and I went to Unity in Fairfax to see a demonstration of mandala making. There are several monks from Tibet building a sand mandala in the sanctuary.   Very interesting. The colors are incredibly bright almost garish especially green. I enjoyed reading some of the Dalai Lama sayings. One of them " The Paradox of Our Age" is as follows:

" The Paradox of Our Age"

 

We have bigger houses but smaller families;

more conveniences, but less time:

We have more degrees, but less sense;

more knowledge, but less judgment;

more experts, but more problems;

more medicines, but less healthiness;

We've been all the way  to the moon and back,

but have trouble crossing the street to meet

the new neighbor.

We built more computers to hold more

information to produce more copies than ever,

but have less communication;

We have become long on quantity,

but short on quality.

These are times of fast foods

but slow digestion;

Tall man but short character;

Steep profits but shallow relationships.

It's a time when there is much in the window,

but nothing in the room.

 

 

The Nottoway garden doesn't look like much but contains past work and future expectations. Perhaps that is what draws me back. I do love working in the garden.  

  

partially completed mandala

pots of colored sand

metal tubes; monks scoop up sand and then rub a metal file over the tube to place the sand on the mandala