The office where my husband works caught fire this weekend. The dentist who works next to him found his entire work space covered in ashes. The blaze fortunately stopped at my husband's door; now it is simply a matter of getting the ashes cleaned, airing out the smokey smell, and turning on the water and power in the building when it is all declared safe again.
No one knows how the fire started. It simply blew in and ignited the building quickly. On the prayer flags we hang every summer in Montana there is the image of the wind horse. The wind horse reminds us of the constant change of being, the impermanence of all things. In other words, stuff doesn't ever stay static - by the very nature of it's existence it's always in flux.
No matter what blows in, or ignites, or shakes up, it's helpful to find a quiet, lovely place and notice all of it, what's happening, the constant movement that is self. It's easy to fall back onto stale routines, conditioning, and distractions and forget to notice the truth, the constant movement behind it all. There's nothing like a brusque wind, or even a fire or earthquake to rattle us all out of our mechanized habits.
It seems impossible at first, to pull away from conditioned distractions, but the hardest part is really just remembering to do it - to sit down and notice what's going on in the first place.. Then it's obvious what's happening, with or without the fire. It becomes so obvious it's beyond easy to see.
...and every so often the wind horse blows through to remind us.
