More on kindness

First of all, I want to ask you to check the comments to the post below (from yesterday) entitled "A way of living and walking through life". Really cool, huh?

Now, we continue our series on kindness. Let's begin by remembering that, according to the meditative tradition, the universal motivation is the wish to be happy. People do what they do because they are trying to be happy. They may, at times, be truly mistaken about what will actually advance that goal, but that's what they're doing fundamentally.

I think we can all see, therefore, how taking the following on board would not only help us in our aspirations but would revolutionize the world if enough people understood it or were simply willing to test it out:

Kindness is closely linked with happiness: the kinder you are to others, the happier you will be.

-- Mary Jaksch (Zen master and psychotherapist)

Sunday art blogging

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Artist: August Macke

Image from Wikimedia Commons

A way of living and walking through life

The Dalai Lama has famously been quoted as saying, "My religion is kindness." There's much to be said for that approach.

More than anything else, kindness is a way of life. It is a way of living and walking through life. It is a way of dealing with all that is--our selves, our bodies, our dreams and goals, our neighbors, our competitors, our enemies, our air, our earth, our animals, our space, our time, and our very consciousness. Do we treat all creation with kindness? Isn't all creation holy and divine?

- Jean Maalouf

I think it would be a good idea for us to focus on kindness for the next few days here at Meditation Matters. I'll see what I can find.

More about the present moment

This is the "one day at a time" principle. So, true; so consoling:

Anyone can carry his burden, however hard, until nightfall. Anyone can do his work, however hard, for one day. Anyone can live sweetly, patiently, lovingly, purely, until the sun goes down. And this is all that life really means.

-Robert Louis Stevenson

Friday cat blogging!

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Something about feelings

Many people assert to me that they can't do something unless they "feel like it". Here's something about that:

You cannot make yourself feel something you do not feel, but you can make yourself do right in spite of your feelings.

-- Pearl S. Buck

Something about regret

Slowly, slowly, I'm sorting through the leftovers from the Center's latest garage sale and deciding what to keep and what to give to Goodwill. This morning I came across a little paperpack book entitled The Joy of Being Human by Eugene Kennedy. Here's a short passage that caught my attention:

Beware if you find that you are blaming other persons for your own difficulties in life. This may be the chief sign by which to diagnose an imminent case of personal regret. The individual who continually justifies his or her own lack of initiative by accusing everyone of duplicity or bad faith in not giving the recognition he or she deserves is almost certainly going to end up bitter and regretful. This is not to say that injustice does not exist; it is to point to a pattern of passivity which puts the burden for our success or achievement on others rather than on ourselves.

Personally, I think this tends to happen because we've been socialized (at least in the U.S.) to believe that, if anything bad happens, someone has to be to blame. It's utterly demoralizing always to blame oneself and so people tend to look for someone else to blame. What would happen if we simply let go of the concept of blame as such altogether? Perhaps establishing blame is helpful from a legal point of view but it rarely supports our ability to heal and get on with our lives.

Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

Change

One of the fundamental principles of meditative practice is acknowledging the reality of impermanence. It's intriguing, really, how we welcome change at times and are averse to it at others. Here's an interesting and somewhat wryly humorous way of looking at that:

There is a certain relief in change, even though it be from bad to worse; as I have found in travelling in a stage-coach, that it is often a comfort to shift one's position and be bruised in a new place.

-- Washington Irving

Both tender and profound

How lovely. How true:

Keep a good heart. That's the most important thing in life. It's not how much money you make or what you can acquire. The art of it is to keep a good heart.

-- Joni Mitchell

Monday meditative picture blogging

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Photo by Cynthia Burgess

I particularly value and appreciate images of gates, doors and windows (they are so symbolic of openness and movement) and so I was delighted when Cynthia sent me the above photo this morning.

Appreciating a blessing

The assertion that not appreciating a blessing is a tragedy strikes me as very true indeed:

In our current state of human development it remains unclear whether we will correct one of life's greatest tragedies, namely, the inability to appreciate a blessing until it is lost.

--Shmuley Boteach

Sunday art blogging

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Artist: August Macke

Image from Wikimedia Commons

Taking stock

How interesting. The Good Housekeeping website has a little feature called 52 ways to beat stress. Here's one of them:

Study Yourself: Ask yourself the following questions, preferably on a daily basis, to develop objectivity on how stress is affecting your life: How did I sleep? What is my mood? How did I respond when something unexpected happened? How does my body feel? Did I have any time to myself? Taking stock in this way can help you see your relationship with stress more clearly, which helps you develop a stress-reduction plan that fits your unique needs.

This is a mindfulness practice, isn't it? Consistent meditation will help us in both asking and answering these questions.

Keeping ourselves present

I get a lot of mileage each day from the "Care 2" site. Today a little article entitled 8 Morning Activities to Keep You Present All Day was offered. Needless to say, I approve of the first activity suggested:

1. Meditate in the morning, even if it’s only for five minutes. As soon as you get out of bed, sit in a comfortable position (away from your bed, to avoid the temptation of going back to sleep). Rather than mentally rushing through the daily to-do list or remorse over your poor quality of sleep, allow your mind to soak in the subtle noises that can only come from the start of a brand new day. Do you hear birds chirping, other family members cooking breakfast? Focus on your in breath and out breath, one lungful of air at a time. Do this every morning, and your days will feel sharper, clearer and more full of life.

Friday cat blogging!

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Photo by Cynthia Burgess

Assumptions

Here's a little quotation I found. There's a lot to this, you know:

Beware of assumptions! Whatever you assume to be possible -- or impossible will have a tendency to become real for you.

-- Source unknown

Listening

Compassion makes this possible. Yes, skill is involved as well, but compassion is the foundation:

When I have been listened to and when I have been heard, I am able to re-perceive my world in a new way and to go on. It is astonishing how elements that seem insoluble become soluble when someone listens, how confusions that seem irremediable turn into relatively clear flowing streams when one is heard. I have deeply appreciated the times that I have experienced this sensitive, empathic, concentrated listening.

-- Carl Rogers

Wednesday life form blogging

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

The value of cultivating awarness

So true:

You got to be careful if you don't know where you're going, because you might not get there.

- Yogi Berra