Let go of our thoughts that distinguish better from worse

Imagine there's no Heaven

It's easy if you try

No Hell below us

Above us only sky

Imagine all the people

Livin' for today

Imagine

Song by John Lennon

What a vast, boundless life unfolds before us! Ordinarily, we spend all our time comparing and discriminating between this and that, always looking around for something good to happen to us. Because of that, we become restless and anxious about everything. As long as we are able to imagine something better than what we have or who we are, it follows naturally that there could be also something worse.

When we let go of our thoughts that distinguish better from worse and instead see everything in terms of the universal self, we are able to settle upon a different attitude towards life - the attitude of magnanimous mind that whatever happens, we are living our self alone. Here a truly peaceful life unfolds.

Whatever happens in our lives can be accepted, since we are universal self in all circumstances. You may imagine that this will leave you completely directionless, but this is not the case, since such a self is not devoid of scenery. Self as the reality of life unfolds the rich quality of life: the scenery of the self, the circumstances of the present. Both past and present exist as the richly textured scenery of the present.

These quotes are from Chapter 7 - Living Wide Awake: Section - The Direction of the Universal, page 131-133, Opening the Hand of Thought by Zosho Uchiyama. I found this chapter very inspiring and could have continued quoting till the end of the chapter. A good one to reread.