Confining or Spacious

From the Idiosyncradeck, the Ten of Swords; from the Mixed Emotions deck, 'Curious:'

          In the bottom of a pit lies a broken sword, yet the night sky is full of stars. It's hard to admit that one's ideas, strategies, and opinions are wrong or aren't working. When what we want or don't want bumps hard into reality, it can twist our minds in strange ways. We may try to think ourselves into a better situation (while holding tightly to our original beliefs). Between our ears this mental method makes sense. But applied in the world, it is ineffective at best and harmful at worst. I've been studying the Buddhist nidanas ('causal links'), a look at how our mind creates our suffering as a reaction to life. Yet just breaking one of those interconnecting links can wake us up, giving us the space to see with clarity. And what happens when we find ourselves in such spaciousness? We become Curious and fascinated with everything, without being so quick to label it with a permanent marker. Our world and the possibilities in it suddenly seem endless rather than confining and oppressive.