Groundhog Day Meditation

As long as we’re thinking about Groundhog Day, how about one of the lovely movies about the spiritual path…

Yes, it is silly. And yes people don’t actually literally live lives over and over again in the reanimation sense. But we do play out our patterns over and over again.

And, there is some hard quest for love that seems to drive us, usually into all the wrong places.

Until and unless we are blessed with a little peek into our hearts.

And so, there is for me something kind of silly wonderful in this little movie.

Even some real hints about real life.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMtWAcVy6-w

Finally, just because, here’s a poem on Groundhog Day by the lovely poet Lynn Ungar

Celebrate this unlikely oracle,
this ball of fat and fur,
whom we so mysteriously endow
with the power to predict spring.
Let’s hear it for the improbable heroes who,
frightened at their own shadows,
nonetheless unwittingly work miracles.
Why shouldn’t we believe
this peculiar rodent holds power
over sun and seasons in his stubby paw?
Who says that God is all grandeur and glory?

Unnoticed in the earth, worms
are busily, brainlessly, tilling the soil.
Field mice, all unthinking, have scattered
seeds that will take root and grow.
Grape hyacinths, against all reason,
have been holding up green shoots beneath the snow.
How do you think spring arrives?
There is nothing quieter, nothing
more secret, miraculous, mundane.
Do you want to play your part
in bringing it to birth? Nothing simpler.
Find a spot not too far from the ground
and wait.