Traditions and Adaptability

My wisdom for the day (I choose one every day from cards, books or from a bin of random ones) is from Chogyam Trungpa, who writes, "We must discover the link between our traditions and our personal experience of life. It is the now - the magic of the present moment - that connects the present with the wisdom of the past."

I so agree with this concept. There is nothing like empty ritual to completely destroy our spiritual connections with our ancestors, our families, our culture. Some say that ritual is the foundation of tradition. I don't agree. I think it is the other way around. Our history has led our people to adopt certain traditions that lead us to expressing them in certain rituals. But history has many loops and holes and twists and turns which continue to unfold into the present. So we need to become adaptable and allow our traditions to hold us steady as our rituals shift with the changing ebbs and flows of the present situations and circumstances. After all, we can no longer survive with the rituals of the ice age. We had to adapt in order to survive. But the essence of what was can still be found in the current traditions. We simply need to look deeply enough. I am also still processing the entire concept, so if anyone out there has something that he or she might like to add for this shaman to also ponder, you are more than welcome to do so. After all, I am adaptable!