Although my path of spirituality encompasses many faiths, I am especially attracted to the precepts of the Buddha. Perhaps it’s my desire for that unmovable, unshakable quality of certainty, all the while knowing that change is the order of the day. Perhaps it’s the understanding that “this too shall pass.” Perhaps it’s the rooted-in-the-earth quality of silence. Or maybe it’s the ability to watch the river of life flow before us and remain the one that is watching.

A friend just sent me this photo from the Japanese Tea Garden in San Francisco. Our trip there was a year ago. Now I am able to look and wonder….who was the I that stood there? Who is the I that is present now? It is all of me and yet none of the past or the future, just presence.

Credit does go to this courageous prince, however, for his determination to break free from the palace walls and enter into the stream of life. He awoke to the agonies and ecstasies of the common man and went on to experience a solution to their suffering. His teaching has endured. Mindfulness is now a popular practice. Sometimes it only takes one brave person to change the course of history.

There is something about the Buddha that I love.