“…end of fishing season”
As the Fall season continues to transition, I took this photo in front of our cabin that I tagged, “…end of fishing season.” In the blurred background are the countless golden needles that have dropped from the giant pine overhead strewn across the ground. It beckons to the days of summer long gone, but reminds us that another season is coming and is well on its way. There is no good plan to delay or halt the process, instead, it’s an allowingness that opens upon itself. The colored metal fish is wedged into one of the cracks of a tree trunk that “snapped off” years ago, and several times during the summer I find myself picking up the fish from off the ground, the wind having blown it down, and I place it once again in its familiar spot. It’s a little game I play with the wind and the fish. Soon now, with the end of fishing season I’ll take it off the worn trunk and place the fish in the winter wood box on the cabin porch until the next season comes around. Then we’ll do it all over again.
Our Sunday Service this week recognizes Indigenous People’s Day with a dual theme of Nature and Human Nature. I have a few slides of our group trip to The Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument Contact Station that we took last year on Indigenous People’s Day Sunday. That is the Nature part. The Human Nature part continues to explore our Covenant and our relations to one another. The title of the talk is “Covenant; A Holding In Common.”
YouTube Channel content for this week is a service led by MaryAlice Mowry on the theme of preparation and the title of the talk is “Preparation – Piece by Piece.” An excerpt from the bulletin reads, “Overall, the theme of preparation in the UUA is not a single, one-time event but an ongoing process. It is a continuous call to ready oneself – spiritually, intellectually, and communally – for the challenges and possibilities of life and faith.” Dale Holden and Ira Dyer are our musicians for the service.
We hope you can join us for one of the services online or in-person.
Enjoy the Fall colors.
In Ministry,
Dave
THIS WEEK’S YOUTUBE SERVICE:
HERE IS THE SERVICE LINK FOR THIS WEEK’S YOUTUBE SERVICE
(Please note it won’t be active until 10AM on Sunday morning)
HERE IS THE ZOOM LINK FOR SUNDAY COFFEE HOUR:
Topic: UUHoulton zoom coffee hour & check-inTime: Oct 12, 2025 11:00 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada) Join Zoom Meetinghttps://us06web.zoom.us/j/87577040562?pwd=sP9oySXbObjz5BTFxq6Ec65SC0X5bS.1
Meeting ID: 875 7704 0562Passcode: 688546
Calendar of Events @UUHoulton
Oct 12 Sunday Service: David Hutchinson
Oct 13 UUHoulton Board Meeting 4PM in the parlor
Oct 18 LGBTQ+ Luncheon 12 Noon
Oct 18 Houlton Coffeehouse 7-9PM Feature: Brian Bouchard
Oct 19 Sunday Service: Kathryn Harnish
Oct 26 Sunday Service: David Hutchinson
Nov 2 Sunday Service: Leigh & Fred
Nov 2 Trivia Night at the UU’s Cup Cafe 12:30-2:30PM
Nov 5 Climate Group Meeting 6PM in the cafe
Nov 9 Sunday Service: David Hutchinson
Nov 10 UUHoulton Board Meeting 4PM in the parlor
Nov 15 LGBTQ+ Luncheon 12 Noon
Nov 15 Houlton Coffeehouse 7-9PM Feature: Bertrand Laurence
Nov 16 Sunday Service: Group Led
Nov 23 Sunday Service: David Hutchinson
Nov 30 Sunday Service: Bill White
PRIDE RIDE
Considering Matthew Shepherd @ The Collins CenterNovember 9
for details check out the link below…
The University of Maine Singers and the Maine Gay Men’s Chorus in collaboration with UMaine’s Collegiate Chorale and Acadia Choral Society present Craig Hella Johnson’s oratorio Considering Matthew Shepard. Pride Aroostook & EqualityMaine have collaborated to reserve 40 tickets to attend this meaningful event as a group in memory of Matthew Shepard.
Pride Aroostook’s Pride Ride is returning! The Pride Ride bus route runs between Presque Isle and the Collins Center for the Arts, with stops in Mars Hill, Houlton, Sherman, and Medway along the way. If you have purchased a concert ticket AND a Pride Ride ticket, please select your preferred pick-up spot! Please email dsmith@pridearoostook.com with any questions regarding the Pride Ride!
The bus schedule is as follows:
Depart UMPI 11:15 AM
Depart Mars Hill 11:35 AM
Depart Houlton 12:20 PM
Depart Sherman 1:05 PM
Depart Medway 1:35 PM
Arrive at Collins Center at approximately 2:35 PM
These tickets are priced on a sliding scale. Pay what you can! There are two ticket types: concert only, and concert ticket + a bus ticket to Pride Aroostook’s Pride Ride, which will be making stops between Presque Isle and the Collins Center for the Arts.
Study Material
Unlocking the Power of Covenant
UUA Publication
Chapter One
A covenant is a mutual sacred promise between individuals or groups, to stay in relationship, care about each other, and work together in good faith. In the Unitarian Universalist tradition, we seek to raise the “we” above the “I” – the community above the individual.
As seekers, we willingly choose to love each other and stay in relationship over and over, again and again. In this way, although we may break promises, by leaning into the transformational power of our faith, we can begin again in covenant to love.Because we are committed to respect for the individual, acceptance of one another, and democratic process, an aspirational covenant that embodies those ideals is a constant reminder of how we are together and why we are together, not separate, but intertwined. No single concept is more central to our faith understanding than being in covenant. It is past the core of our identity. It s how we try to build and sustain the Beloved Community. It is the foundation of our governance structures at all levels. Here we just wish to note that there are multiple ways in which we rely on convents for boundaries, tools, and inspiration, to call us to our better selves, and to hold ourselves an others accountable.
The power of accountability is that we are given the space to be more honest with each other. The sharing in relationship, the mutuality, is where the power is invested…Covenant requires that we be present to and for one another, that we engage in community, and that we work together for the good of the entire community. The power of covenant keeps us in community together. It seeks to prevent us from walking away when that might be the easy thing to do. It requires us to be accountable to ourselves and to each other.
| Moment of Reflection |
| Image Description: A colorful display of many hanging lanterns. |
| We seek our place in the world and the answers to our hearts’ deep questions. As we seek, may our hearts be open to unexpected answers. May we be reminded that all beings are whole, sacred, and worthy. Let our hearts be welcoming of multiple truths, not holding hard or fast to closed mindedness or judgmental thinking. What can we learn from each other in the richness of our differences? May the heart of compassion help us recognize the sacred in each other and bridge differences in these challenging times. May each of us be held in relationship, accountability, and the power of beloved community. Blessed Be. — From “The Richness of Our Differences” by Julianne Lepp UUA Website |
How Not to Freak Out
If you find all the bad news overwhelming, Buddhist teacher Judy Lief has some meditations to help you relieve your anxiety.
It’s not as if times of fear and despair are anything new. People have fought wars, struggled to survive, faced injustice, experienced loss, dealt with violence and greed, and been caught up in historical movements beyond their control pretty much forever.
Life has never been that easy.
In Buddhist practice, you learn never to shy away from facing the pain of the human condition. At the same time, you also learn not to shy away from the beauty and value of life in all its forms.
By clearly seeing the extremes of experience, you learn to scout a middle way.
It is easy to become so consumed by your fears for this world that you lose your balance. It is hard to think about the challenges facing our planet and not feel overwhelmed.
It seems as if we humans never learn. Instead, we keep perpetuating the same dysfunctional behavior in every generation. Only now, we have the capacity to create havoc on a global scale, to the extent of threatening the continuation of life on this planet. We not only continue to rely on age-old habits of violence, greed, and deception, but we have put these habits on steroids.
On an individual level, we can’t seem to stretch beyond the narrow bounds of self-interest and looking out for number one. This focus on ourselves feeds our fear and makes us susceptible to manipulation. It feels as if the worse things get, the more frantically we apply approaches that have never worked.
Because these times happen to be our times, for us they seem uniquely difficult. But it is hard to imagine any time that has not seemed troubled to the people who were experiencing it.
To the extent that our world is dominated by hatred, greed, and ignorance, known in Buddhism as the three poisons, it is because we have collectively made it so.
The Buddhist notion of samsara implies that all times are troubled. Not only that, but the troubles we complain about are the very troubles we ourselves create and perpetuate. So to the extent that our world is dominated by hatred, greed, and ignorance, known in Buddhism as the three poisons, it is because we have collectively made it so.
The idea of samsara could be taken as an extremely pessimistic view of things. But it could also be a quite liberating message.
It is liberating to drop the fantasy of there being a more perfect world, somehow, somewhere, and instead accept that we need to engage with the world as it is. It is our world, it is messy, but it is fertile ground for awakening. It is the same world, after all, that gave birth to the Buddha.
It is easy to be overwhelmed by all the problems in this world. You may already be overwhelmed by the problems in your own life. On top of that, you are continually bombarded with news about political, humanitarian, and environmental problems.
There seems to be no end of problems. While you are worrying about human trafficking, you get an email about starving giraffes in Indonesia. When you are distressed about racial hatred, you hear about the latest famine. While you are learning about nuclear proliferation, a politician says something outrageous. It never lets up and it is hard to catch your breath. The continual bombardment of bad news can infiltrate so deeply that it subtly infuses everything you do.
Ironically, it is only this disappointment with the world—with human beings and their stupidity, and with ourselves—that provides a powerful enough motivation to change. Traditionally, reaching the point where you see through the futility of samsara is considered an essential breakthrough on the spiritual path.
For many people, it is the experience of disappointment in its many forms that leads them to the dharma and to the practice of meditation.
Disappointment is a great instigator. From it, positive seeds of change can emerge. When we feel genuine remorse about our own contribution to the samsara project, it strengthens our longing for an alternative and our determination to find a better way to live.
You could go on for years, drifting along in your complacency, not wanting to let the world’s pain touch you. But when it does, you are primed for transformation. Your willingness to feel the suffering of samsara begins to draw out from you a bright stream of compassion for all beings.
When you get news of something disturbing, it is good to pay attention to the shape of your reaction. If you hear about a suicide bombing in Lahore, for instance, what is your immediate response?
You could pretend none of this is happening, that it has nothing to do with you. But because you are human, like it or not, you cannot help but care about such things.
You need to recognize your ability to care and appreciate it for the gift it is. You can actually care about something beyond yourself! You can care about others, you can care about our Mother Earth, you can care about structures of oppression. How amazing that you have not shut down, that you have not given up!
What about when you feel that the intensity of this world is just too much? When you’re caught between freaking out and shutting down?
This is the moment when you need to step back and get some perspective. When you feel your mind/heart filled to the point of claustrophobia with thoughts of disaster, fear, and despair, it is good to bring to mind the many counter examples of human kindness and sanity, which are so easily overlooked.
If you think about it, the degree in which our world is stitched together with loving-kindness is extraordinary. To a surprising extent, accomplishing the simplest daily tasks requires that most people we encounter will be relatively decent, even kind. This network of decency is so close at hand, so mundane and ordinary, that it is mostly invisible to us. Even in the midst of the most dire conditions, there are countless examples of people who still manage to love, share, help one another, smile, and laugh.
When you get news of something disturbing, it is good to pay attention to the shape of your reaction. If you hear about a suicide bombing in Lahore, for instance, what is your immediate response?
Most likely it is one of empathy. You imagine how horrible it must be to witness such a thing. You think about how painful it must be to be killed or injured or to lose a loved one so suddenly and violently. You imagine how it must feel to be stuck in a country at war with no means to get out.
That natural response of human empathy and kindness is tender and raw, and at the same time, it is uplifted and beautiful.
If possible, notice and stay with your empathetic response and get to know it. It is simple and immediate, but it also tends to be fleeting and subtle. It is good to keep coming back to that natural compassionate response to suffering, for it is easily lost in the complexities that follow.
The plot thickens as our innocent and natural response to suffering is captured by ego’s defense mechanisms. That tender response, with its rawness and vulnerability, gets taken over by our emotional habits and fixed views. We are fearful and we want the world to make sense. We are angry and we want revenge. We don’t want to feel the pain of caring, so we feed our negativity as a way to deflect it outward.
You do not need to let your thoughts and reactions run wild. You can interrupt the pattern.
This also unleashes our urge to fix things. We don’t want to keep feeling this way. We want to act! “There’s got to be something I can do to about this right now!” The problem is that often we are in no position to really help.
In response, you could let helplessness overwhelm you, but you don’t have to do so.
You need to accept the fact that you can’t fix everything, much as you would like to.
The world needs help, but our ability to contribute seems so miniscule compared to the many problems facing the planet. The challenges are so overwhelming that we see no way out. What do we do with that frustration?
If you stay with the energy of the impulse to act, you can see that it is a positive irritant. We need a little provocation or creative restlessness in order to connect with what underlies our impulse to act and open up to its message.
So you can take your urge to help as a good sign. But you need to take a clear look at what you really have to offer. You need to start with a self-assessment and a bit of humility.
The great Buddhist teacher Shantideva made the point that if you can do something about an issue, then go ahead and do it. But if you can’t do anything, then acknowledge that and let it go. It doesn’t help to dwell on everything that is going wrong or obsess about wishing you could do more.
It is better to do one small thing that you can actually pull off than to fantasize about all the great things you would like to be able to do but can’t.
Captured by powerful emotions and flurries of speculative thought, we can work ourselves into a frenzy by obsessing about events we have no direct connection with or control over. This is an important pattern to notice. We can see that we are mostly responding to what is in our own head, to our mental chorus of what-if’s. How easily our tender little pebbles of empathy can get buried under a mountain of thoughts.
It is one thing to engage in analysis or try to read the handwriting on the wall so you can respond appropriately to developments in the world. But it is quite another to engage in mental cud chewing, which warps your initial tender response and makes it about yourself.
Notice how obsessive, what-if thinking can take you over, then bring yourself back to the here and now.
It may not seem like it, but when you are stuck in fearful and despairing thoughts, you do have a choice. You do not need to let your thoughts and reactions run wild. You can interrupt the pattern. You can slow down enough to investigate the cascade of thoughts, speculations, opinions, and emotions aroused by hearing about all the troubles in the world.
You can understand more clearly your own particular default patterns, with all their complexities, and bring yourself back to the simple natural arising of care and empathy.
It is possible to walk a path between the extremes of pessimism and optimism.
In order to respond with skill and compassion, you do not need to come to a solid conclusion about the nature of the world. You do not need either to cling to your view of how bad things are, or to close yourself off from whatever disturbs your rosy view of things.
If you look at your own experience from day to day, you can see the shifty quality of such judgments. “I had a good day. It was warm and sunny and I felt great. But yesterday I had a crummy day. It was rainy, I got the flu, and I fell behind in my work.”
In any individual life, there are easier and harder times. Circumstances are always changing. They change slowly and inexorably, and they change suddenly and unexpectedly. Often we see our own hand in the circumstances we experience, and sometimes we are blindsided by situations beyond our control.
When things are going relatively smoothly, it is easy to become complacent and assume that our good fortune will automatically continue. When things are not going well, we also assume that nothing will ever change, and we succumb to defeatism. In both cases we take whatever we are experiencing currently and project it into the future, selectively recalling past experiences that reinforce our view of the way things are.
Our struggle to pin down our living on-the-spot experience of life is futile. We may attempt to get a grasp on life, to pin it down or make it manageable in some way, but it is hard to see beyond the circumstances and mood of the moment.
There seem to be only two alternatives: the glass is half full or the glass is half empty. But a glass with water up to the midpoint is not making a statement either way. It is neither half full nor half empty. Neither is it both half full and half empty. Such a water glass is not elated by being half full, nor discouraged by being half empty. It just is: a glass with water in it.
The world just is. It is not a this-versus-that, good-versus-bad world. It is an interdependent world.
This interdependent world is the dancing ground of bodhisattvas, who thrive in the dynamism of life. By recognizing that every sorrow invites a fresh compassionate response, the bodhisattva path gives us a much broader perspective on our situation. Bodhisattvas are the ones who see the depth and breadth of suffering and confusion most clearly, yet they place themselves right in the midst of it.
I have often wondered: how can bodhisattvas sit there so elegantly and smile? It may be because they have learned that no matter how bad things become, it is possible to change one’s attitude on the spot. The flow of compassion cannot be interrupted. In fact, with each new crisis, its flow is increased.
At any moment, as my teacher Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche once told me, “You could just cheer up!”
Judy Lief is a Buddhist teacher and the editor of many books of teachings by the late Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche. She is the author of Making Friends with Death. Her teachings and new podcast, “Dharma Glimpses,” are available at judylief.com.Linda made it to India and has begun her internship at the Aatma Ayurvedic Clinic! Linda’s teacher Anusha,is the second from the left. You can check out Linda’s Substack posts at lindayurveda
Prayer List
For those working for social justice and societal change
Pray for peaceful action and democratic process in our nation
The war in Ukraine continues
Prayers for the worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza
Prayers for those affected by recent governmental (and policy) changes in DC
Please pray for peace and civility as the nation responds to the assassination of Charlie Kirk
Prayers for those affected by the shooting at the synagogue in Manchester, England last week
Prayers for those affected by the school building collapse in Indonesia last week
Prayers for the peace process in the Middle East
Prayers for Karen who fell last week and is recovering
The Four Limitless Ones Prayer
May all sentient beings enjoy happiness and the root of happiness.
May we be free from suffering and the root of suffering.
May we not be separated from the great happiness devoid of suffering.
May we dwell in the great equanimity free from anger, aggression and delusion.
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