Aware of my friend as she was in surgery, my eye was caught by the front of a beautiful book standing upright on my bookshelf. The words “Each time you judge yourself you break your own heart,”  jumped out at me. The book, Meditation Art, Openings to Awareness, was created by my friend Etta B. Ehrlich. For years, we were in Sensory Awareness workshops together.  Older than I, she passed away a few years ago.  In the book, she pastes words of wisdom on interesting bottles, and Virginia Brown photographs them.  The book, a treasure, is no longer available, but I found some photos from a gallery in which the bottles were displayed.

She quotes our teacher Charlotte Selver in the book.  Here’s one quote.

“Pay attention to the breath as it is now. As your breathing is, so you are. Since breathing happens by itself, it teaches us to trust what is needed now and to allow it.This can be the foundation for a whole new perception of ourselves in all our functions. I agree that it is difficult to be so peaceful and undemanding that one would really be present in one’s breathing activity without influencing it.”

As I wait for news on my friend, I sit with intention to “notice precisely where inhalations and exhalations begin and end”.