For the past two weeks I have been helping a friend through a life and death sort of crisis not knowing all the while that I've had heaven and hell going on in my own life. At times I've been in heaven, at other times a nightmarish hell.
I came to think of this story :
Heaven and Hell
There's a samurai who wants to learn the difference between heaven and hell so he journeys far and wide to find a Master who can answer his question.
Finally standing before the Master and asks him " What's the difference between heaven and hell?"
The Master takes the samurai’s sword and, turning it to the flat of the blade hits him on the head.
The samurai is surprised but chooses to ignore it thinking that the Master has probably misunderstood the question so he repeats his question " What's the difference between heaven and hell ?"
Again the Master strikes the samurai on the head. The samurai staggers back completely baffled by this and approaches with his question a third time but before he can utter a word, the Master strikes him a third time.
Well that does it ! Something snaps inside the samurai and he grabs his sword from the Master, raises it over his head and is about to bring it down on the Master’s head when the Master raises one finger and the samurai stops.
"That is hell," says the Master.
At this the samurai becomes so overcome by the courage of this frail old man that he falls on his knees and bows before the Master.
"That is heaven," says the Master.
Marvellous to be so uninhibited and so unconditioned. 
It's Tim's dad's 40th birthday today and they are going to have a party. I expect he's excited too.
