Compassion into action

Just believing in compassion doesn't get us very far:

Everybody can be great. Because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and your verb agree to serve. You don't have to know about Plato and Aristotle to serve. You don't have to know Einstein's theory of relativity to serve. You don't have to know the second theory of thermodynamics to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.

- Martin Luther King Jr

St. Michael, the Archangel

Today is Michaelmas - or the Feast Day of St. Michael and All Angels.

Michael the Archangel is the patron of the following:

Artists; bakers; bankers; battle; boatmen; cemeteries; coopers; endangered children; dying; Emergency Medical Technicians; fencing; grocers; hatmakers; holy death; knights; mariners; mountaineers; paramedics; paratroopers; police officers; radiologists; sailors; the sick; security forces; soldiers; against storms at sea; swordsmiths; those in need of protection.

Do you fall into any of these categories? You can call on St. Michael or look to him for protection.

And remember, the word "angel" simply means messenger. Maybe it would do us all some good to reflect with gratitude on the various angels who have turned up in our lives over the years.

Friday cat blogging!

Leroy under the desk

Photo by Cynthia Burgess

Why perseverence matters

I've known for some time that there are studies demonstrating the effectiveness of meditation in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis. Only today have I learned some important details about how that works:

With an average age of 54, most of the patients were female, white, married, college-educated, middle-class, and all were free of either psychiatric illness or alcohol or drug addiction.

During the trial, all the patients continued to be treated by their regular doctor and to take whatever medication they'd been taking before the study began.

At the start of the study, and two and six months later, all the patients completed questionnaires to assess depressive symptoms and psychological distress. Also, blood measures of inflammation were taken and an assessment of tender and swollen joints was done to evaluate current RA status.

By the two-month mark, both the meditation and the non-meditation groups had shown equal levels of improvement in terms of depression and emotional symptoms.

But by six months, there was a "significant" difference in perceived psychological distress between the two groups -- those practicing mediation reported a 35 percent reduction in psychological distress.

It's so important not to throw in the towel too early! We westerners are so addicted to instant gratification. We need patience from the get-go and a willingness to persevere until the benefits of meditation have time to kick in.

Our lives are our stories

The ways in which we apply what we believe to be spiritual truths, the ways in which we integrate them into our ordinary lives, speak more loudly than our actual words:

Our lives are our stories. Ultimately it is the state of our total being that affects the world. I was impressed by a comment made by someone who was part of a party invited to dialogue with the Dalai Lama. While this person was certainly interested in what His Holiness had to say, he admitted that he mainly wanted to see how the Dalai Lama tied his shoes. That’s what eventually affects us most of all, isn’t it? Not the eloquence of words, nor books and concepts, but the way the truth is being lived in the world.

-- Gloria Karpinski in Barefoot on Holy Ground

Let's all pay attention to how we "tie our shoes!"

Wednesday life form blogging

Photo by Cynthia Burgess

Giving AND receiving

This is so true:

The happy heart gives away the best. To know how to receive is also a most important gift, which cultivates generosity in others and keeps strong the cycle of life.

-- Dhyani Ywahoo in Voices of Our Ancestors

When we refuse to accept a gift or a service graciously, we are devaluing the generosity of others. And that is not a loving or compassionate thing to do at all!

The gift of presence

Another one from Spirituality and Practice:

There is a Jewish tradition that a single visit to someone's sickbed takes away one sixtieth of their illness. The ancient sages understood that just being in the presence of another human being can lift a person up.

— Naomi Levy in To Begin Again

Ah, yes, I know this to be true!

Surgery recovery

Well, as will not surprise you, meditation helps. Take a look at this excerpt from an article entitled "Doctors ignorant of natural therapies":

"Studies have shown that patients who received antioxidants, meditation, music therapy and stress management before surgery had less complications and went home earlier," Dr Braun said. "It's simple - if we have evidence-based complementary medicines and we are truly practising evidence-based medicine, then we need to use complementary medicines."

Well, all I can say is that maybe the complications I had would have been even worse than they were if I were not a meditator! :-)

Equinox

This year the autumnal equinox was today at 9:51 Universal Time:

The Autumnal Equinox signals the end of the summer months and the beginning of winter. At this time of year, days have been shortening since the Summer Solstice some three months earlier, and the Equinox is the point where nights reach the same length as days. After this point, the Sun will shine lower and lower on the horizon until the Winter Solstice in about three months' time.

Summer is over, folks!

No spring, nor summer beauty hath such grace
As I have seen in one autumnal face;

-- John Donne

Oh, this is really, really good

The following is a "Spiritual Practice of the Day" found on the Spirituality and Practice website:

I once saw a cartoon depicting two Buddhist monks seated side by side in a meditation hall. An older monk was muttering something to a younger monk out of the corner of his mouth. The young monk looked dumbfounded. The caption read: "Nothing happens next. This is it."

— Clark Strand in The Wooden Bowl

To Practice This Thought: Be present right now. Don't think about what's going to happen next.

Are you taking care of yourself?

This is important:

Self-care is not selfish or self-indulgent. We cannot nurture others from a dry well. We need to take care of our own needs first, then we can give from our surplus, our abundance.

— Jennifer Louden in The Woman's Comfort Book

Friday cat blogging!

Henry

Photo by Ellie Finlay

Another wonderful Rumi quote!

Rumi understands mystical love and ecstacy!

Hear from the heart wordless mysteries!
Understand what cannot be understood!
In humanity's stone-dark heart there burns a fire
That burns all veils to their root and foundation.
When the veils are burned away, the heart will understand completely...
Ancient Love will unfold ever-fresh forms
In the heart of the Spirit, in the core of the heart.

Practicing gratitude

We need many reminders:

Gratitude for the gift of life is the primary wellspring of all religions, the hallmark of the mystic, the source of all true art....It is a privilege to be alive in this time when we can choose to take part in the self-healing of our world.

-- Joanna Macy

Wednesday life form blogging

Photo by Cynthia Burgess

Preparing for death

The Meditation Society of Australia has this for its daily meditation today:

The best way to prepare for death is to spend every day of life as though it were the last. Think of the end of worldly honor, wealth and pleasure and ask yourself: And then? And then?

-- St. Philip Romolo Neri

It's the old "you can't take it with you" observation. A good one to remember!

Tuesday meditative picture blogging

Photo by Bill Miller

Getting to know your own mind

I want to show you an excerpt from an article called Mindfulness and Meditation in the Modern World:

As a moment of silence is filled with thoughts of distraction, desire for noise, company, or movement, you begin to discover how your mind works. The hum of a clock elicits a cycle of thoughts and feelings of movement, again you begin to understand how your mind works. Over time and practice, you may gain patience, first a tolerance, then an embrace of a deeper understanding of your self and your relationship to the world. The repetitive pattern of 'discovery' can arise in everything you do, and you may discover that introspection and reflection have created a space between experience and your reactions to them, a space in which you can choose your response. Practicing over and over while sitting, while walking, or doing daily activities are part of learning to be more mindful. Everyday objects can replace the breath in practice. For example, you can eat mindfully, observing the texture, smell, and taste of each bite of food, giving it your full attention. In this way, mindfulness can be integrated into daily life, when talking, walking, listening, or relating to others, the planet, or yourself.

Perhaps mindfulness, meditation, and other mind-body practices (such as yoga and tai chi) are increasing in popularity in the West because they let us experience internal investigation, without it being so verbal in nature. They provide us with an awareness of the chatter within and around us, they provide us with a gift of listening, they provide us with great insight into our very nature. It is a misperception to think that meditation means silencing the mind, silencing thoughts or feelings; it is a process of learning about the mind, full of the complexity it holds.

Mindfulness meditation is about really getting to know yourself. It's not about "making the mind go blank" or any such nonsense. It's about seeing what's really there and getting acquainted with our habitual reactions. Only then can we make different choices than we have habitually done and thereby improve our lives.

Whatever words or sounds you use

Eloquently expressed:

Everybody prays whether [you think] of it as praying or not. The odd silence you fall into when something very beautiful is happening or something very good or very bad. The ah-h-h-h! that sometimes floats up out of you as out of a Fourth of July crowd when the sky-rocket bursts over the water. The stammer of pain at somebody else s pain. The stammer of joy at somebody else's joy. Whatever words or sounds you use for sighing with over your own life. These are all prayers in their way. These are all spoken not just to yourself but to something even more familiar than yourself and even more strange than the world.

-- Frederick Buechner