The other morning our two sons watched a great episode of the Australian kid show Bluey. Like millions of other parents, I love this show – it completely captures the lived experience of kids’ imaginations.
The episode features a series of dreams involving Bluey’s younger sister, Bingo. In the dreams she floats in space with her favourite stuffed bunny, passing planets and suns, alternately clutching her bunny and letting it go – basically showcasing healthy attachment, to get nerdy and developmental about it. Cosmic vistas, gentle piano, pink bunny’s big eyes and open arms as she drifts slowly and inevitably away. We can’t hold onto childish things! Damn you, makers of Bluey, making me sniffle over my breakfast cereal.
Our five-year-old son was riveted. Afterwards, he wanted to see “Old Babogie,” his own original stuffed bunny, whose head is half-gnawed off and with whom he still sleeps every night. He turned to me and said “Dada, I feel happysad.” He told me he misses and loves his Babogie even though Babogie is right here.
“Happysad” is his artful term for the complicated poignancy of life. I know the feeling. Maybe you do too. I get it every day with my kids. The hand that grips your palm, where once it could barely fit around your index finger. The skipping walk that was once a careening toddle. The perfect pronunciation of “tomato” that means you’ll never again hear your child say “meenya-mo.”
Impermanence can be bittersweet. Bitter because the losses are real. Sweet because there’s love in the mourning, and each new moment brings fresh possibility.
In Buddhism, this changeability isn’t only a macro-statement of truth; it’s also a micro-description of moment-to-moment experience. I vividly tasted this on my meditation retreat last week, in a quiet hall overlooking the golden hills of Marin County. First, the newness of things, the freshness of sounds and sensations, of bird songs and my own body fizzing upwards like a can of soda. It was thrilling. But then, inevitably, the endings of things, the clear and at times heartbreaking recognition that no matter how hard I try to hold on to something or someone, everything – including myself – is continually slipping away.
It’s one thing to know this conceptually; it’s another to experience it consciously, in real time, right where I sat. There were moments I felt ready to collapse into a pile of pixie dust. And then the breath would find me, a ballast in my belly, me and one hundred other slow-breathers. The meditation hall would fill with late afternoon sunlight, everyone perfectly still and poised at the edge of … of what? No words for it, not really, but you can feel it in the room.
Thank you, meditation. This incredible training in presence without fixation. We need this composure now more than ever.
My friends! It’s good to be home in wet, cold Toronto. Let’s meditate on the slow-motion refreshment of the moment, with a bunch of happysad love at the end.
Jeff
CEC Summer Retreat: Meditate! Celebrate! Activate!
August 29-September 1, 2025
Five Oaks Education & Retreat Centre, Ontario, Canada (yes, we know you want to move here)
The
’s legendary summer retreat is back! We sit in MEDITATION through the day, a mix of solo and guided excursions into sound, energy, openness, silence and gratitude … thus opening a space for our afternoon ACTIVATION sessions, where we play with our insights live, in community. What emerges naturally when there’s trust and relaxation and the right proportion of irreverence? CELEBRATION! Evening song circles around the campfire, and an ebullient dance party on the final night. Basically we have a good time. What else is meditation for if it can’t deliver on that?Come join
, Erin Oke, James Maskalyk (), and others from the CEC Teaching Team, including Jeff, who will likely be virtual, as he drives a packed car across the country to start a (probable) year-long family sabbatical near Vancouver …
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