Knowing More and Doing Less

I can't help myself that I yet again need to share a passage from one of my favorite yoga and meditation teachers, Rolf Gates in his book, "Meditations on Intention and Being." As I hustle bustle attempt to get settled in my new state of Colorado and next chapter of life, I am confronted with the business of "doing." Thankfully, every morning during my meditation and yoga practice, I get quiet and try to remind myself and return to my world of "knowing." And then for seconds, hours, if I'm lucky, all day, the hustle bustle weighs less and all is well. Yesterday morning, this was the passage I read in perfect  timing,...

"The world of doing is busy and loud and the people who live there like it that way. In the world of doing, noise and agitation mean things are getting done. In the world of knowing, things tend to get done with silence and stillness. Patience turns out to be a real go-getter with a capacity for getting things done that almost nothing else matches. In the world of knowing, we are happy to live without many of the things that are needed in the world of doing. In fact, very few things turn out to be absolutely necessary, which saves us a lot of time and energy. In the world of knowing, listening is necessary, as are learning to forgive, saying "I love you," laughing, and spending time on activities whose only purpose is the experience of joy. The world of doing care only for what can be seen; the world of knowing flows from the unseen world of being. The people who live in the world of knowing love what can be seen because they know where it comes from and where it is going. In the world of knowing, nobody ever does anything— yet everything gets done."