This Week’s Quotation for
Meditation With Movement
June 6th, 2025
The Flood of Attachment
Sweeping us in the torrent of cyclic existence so hard to cross Where, conditioned by the propelling winds of karma, We are tossed in the waves of birth, aging, sickness, and death: The flood of attachment—please protect us from this danger!
Like a flood, attachment sweeps over us, propelling us helplessly in the stormy ocean of cyclic existence. It does this in two ways. First, under the influence of attachment-which clings to persons, objects, places, ideas, views, and so forth—we act in harmful ways in order to get what we want. Our destructive actions create conflict with others now and leave imprints on our mindstream that produce suffering situations later. Second, at the time of death, attachment arises once more, and we cling to our body and life. When we realize we cannot hold on to them any longer, attachment then grasps another body and life, and we are reborn in cyclic existence. Attachment resembles a flood; we are powerlessly swept along by its current. When our mind is attached to something, it has no space for anything else. We are obsessed with the object of our attachment; we worry about not getting it and fear losing it once we do. Drowning in the flood of attachment, we cannot breathe the fresh air of satisfaction and peace. We may want to get to dry land, but not seeing a life raft, we continue to be swept along uncontrollably. The Dharma is our life raft. Let's make sure we hold on to it and not let it float past us.
How to free your mind: the practice of Tara, the Liberator, Thubten Chodron, p.52