"I can't call a blog that, Jeremy!"

In high school, I took a class called Comparative Religions; one of the units was on the branches on Buddhism. I remember learning then, for the first time, about sand mandalas. Huge, intricate designs made on the floors of Buddhist monks utilizing nothing but individually placed grains of dyed sand. I thought for months about old, patient monks with wise and withered faces and clad in orange robes devoting the hours of their days to the colourful reality of sand at their feet. Every grain of sand is delicately placed into the patterns; the process can take days, months, even years.

A finished mandala is always breathtaking - both for the beauty it gives to the world and also the dedication it represents.

When the mandala is done, the monks step back, take a look at the result of hours of backbreaking work, pick up a broom and sweep the whole thing up.

The monks call mandalas a discipline in release, a teaching that beauty is temporary and fleeting, and they much be as able and willing to let go of it as they were to create it in the first place.

In my life, I am currently cleaning up the remnants of my last mandala.

I am learning to be free of my grief for what was once beautifully layed out at my feet, and is now swept up and given to the winds.