Charles Minguez

Life has a funny way of changing the lesson. Sometimes the real practice begins when things don’t go according to plan. everydaybuddha.substack.com/…

A Buddhist nun. A bag of coffee beans. A sloth on a coffee mug. None of them solved my problems. But together, they reminded me of something I couldn’t see for myself. everydaybuddha.substack.com/…

Sometimes the practice isn’t learning how to fill the empty spaces in our lives. Sometimes it’s learning how to sit in them. 📷: Guilford, PA open.substack.com/pub/everyd…

Somewhere along the way, play became optional. A canceled concert turned into an afternoon standing barefoot in a creek, collecting stones and remembering something I didn’t realize I’d forgotten. Maybe joy doesn’t have to be useful. Read: everydaybuddha.substack.com/…

The water didn’t fight what was in front of it. Fallen branches, rocks, bends in the current—it moved around them. No forcing. No urgency. Just movement. And I wondered how long it had been since I let myself move through life like that. 📷: Pequea, PA

“It is play,” I said. “Maybe we just forgot.” Somewhere along the way, play became optional. Childish, even. Something squeezed out by schedules and responsibilities and the quiet pressure to always be productive.

No one else can choose healing for us. Not our partner. Not our friends. They can sit beside us. Hold us. Remind us we are loved. But at some point, we have to decide whether we’re ready to loosen our grip on the thing that keeps pulling us under. 📷: Appalachian Trail

I went into the forest because I was feeling disconnected. I wanted to be alone. What I found instead was a quiet reminder: Maybe we’re never as separate as we think we are. I Went Into the Forest to Be Alone everydaybuddha.substack.com/…

A man climbed over the rocks and sat down right beside me, talking as if we’d known each other for years. He introduced himself as Tank. “We all have trail names out here,” he said. From my upcoming Substack, which drops 6/15.

The solitude is something I’ve been craving. Bathing in the beauty of nature is something I’ve been craving. Getting “lost” is something I’ve been craving. I can’t stop thinking about the forest. It’s calling me. 📷: Michaux State Forest

Sometimes when that feeling shows up, I want to disappear for a while. No phone signal. No conversations. Just distance. So I head into the forest. 📷: Michaux State Forest

How is this happening? Every time I think I’m falling apart, something unexpectedly good happens. New post: everydaybuddha.substack.com/…

Showing up when I want to disappear. Continuing when things feel uncertain. Taking small steps when, I’d rather escape into the desert. 📷: Marble Canyon, AZ open.substack.com/pub/everyd…

So when I ask myself, “How is this happening?” the only real answer I can find is this. Through faith. Through effort. Through patient acceptance. open.substack.com/pub/everyd…

The knot in your stomach. The tightness in your throat. The hesitation you can’t explain. Is it intuition? Or fear trying to protect you? A reflection on learning the difference: everydaybuddha.substack.com/…

Breathing in, I take your pain.
Breathing out, I give love. And in this way,
my breath becomes like medicine. open.substack.com/pub/charle…

We all have bad days. Maybe that, too, belongs. Let it be an offering. Let it crack your heart wide open. open.substack.com/pub/charle…

Sometimes it scares us to realize we’re both the garden and the gardener. So much held in our hands. Will we tend to it? And trust our thumbs can slowly turn green?

Forgiveness, maybe, is no longer carrying the heat of what happened everywhere you go. open.substack.com/pub/charle…