There is a small green island where one where one white cow lives/ alone, a meadow of an island.// The cow grazes till nightfall, full and fat, but during the/ night she panics and grows// thin as a single hair. “What shall I eat tomorrow? There’s/ nothing left!” By dawn,// the grass has grown up again, waist-high. The cow starts/ eating and by dark the/ meadow is clipped short. She’s full of strength and energy, but she panics in the dark// as before, and grows abnormally thin overnight. The cow/ does this over and over,// and this is all she does. She never thinks, “This meadow has never failed to grow back.// Why should I be afraid every night that it won’t?” The cow is the bodily soul. The// island field is this world where that grows lean with fear and fat with blessing, lean// and fat. White cow, don’t make yourself miserable with what’s to come, or not to come.

Rumi

“White cow, don’t make yourself miserable with what’s to come, or not to come.” I need to read this advice everyday. Ten times a day if I have to. It is so easy to focus on the barren meadow at night fall and miss the grass that grows every day. Every day it grows and every day my bodily soul thirsts, and I grow lean with fear and fat with blessing. “Trust the grass,” I tell myself. Faith and fear are mutually exclusive and I want to be a person of faith.

At the end of each day, is it easier to focus on what we don’t have, or suffering, or lack? Is it easier to choose misery? Is misery more comfortable than stillness? How do we find stillness on our island? Stillness comes in knowing the grass grows. Stillness comes in savoring every bite of grass and moment of sunshine. Stillness comes in believing our island is enough.