Loving Kindness

My theme this month is receptivity and love. The habits of love include generosity, honesty, patience and equanimity, forgiveness, gratitude, communication, respect, kindness and care - among others. 

Today I'm thinking about loving-kindness, our outward expression of day-to-day love. I practice kindness with polite language, and other small acts and habits like gracefully waiting my turn, using a friendly tone of voice, offering help, giving a compliment, or a simple smile. When I'm at my best, I extend kindness to friends and family, co-workers, neighbors, strangers and service workers, and also to animals, plants, and to the Earth.

We begin to learn to be kind when we are small, so we should be experts, but we still manage to be rude and hurtful at least sometimes, maybe unintentionally, and if not out loud, at least in our thoughts.

My own growing edge is to remember to be kind in the face of the meanness of others; to "counter the barrage of contempt and disrespect in the world by bringing forth a kinder, gentler presence," as Marvin Thomas says in "Personal Village". I practice by using kind words in my inner dialogue (“She has a generous heart” rather than “What an idiot.”).

Agenda:

1. Start a Love Journal

2. Pink Light of Love meditation
3. Read from two books
4. Visualize God

5. Speak little, listen much

1. Start a Love Journal:

Growing in any of the habits of love requires some introspective, so for this next 4-weeks I will keep a Love Journal. I've found that this is the thing that most helps me to grow in love and effectiveness, because I clearly see the habits and patterns in my relationships. 

When I recall the moments when I lost my cool, and realize the concentric circles of stress I released on others, I am motivated again to be a more patient person. I set specific intentions, such as: "When I feel belittled or lectured at, I intend to breath into my heart, listen, and find the grain of truth."

 
Each day I will:

• First review conversations and interactions I had yesterday, and my general frame of mind with the world, and note places I could have done better.
• Next, think about the people I will see today, and the conversations I may have, and make note of times when I might need to draw on love habits. 
• Brainstorm some goals for extending kindness to the world in the days or months ahead. Answer these queries: 

-What is my growing edge - where do I most need to focus my attention, when it comes to love? 

-With whom could I be kinder, or what kinds of situations most often push me out of kindness? 

-How can I bring mindfulness to the practice of kindness in the ordinary setting of every day?

2. Pink Light of Love meditation:

I've made a vow to meditate for ten minutes every day, and to end each practice by extending loving-kindness to the universe. My app rings a bell at the mid-way point of my meditation and that's when I begin this sequence:

• Focus on the tender emotion of generous love. Allow a smile to settle on my face and in my heart.
• Visualize love as soft, tingly, warm, pink light, and see it move from my heart to every part of my body so that every cell is glowing and vibrating. 
• See the pink light of love radiating to fill the whole room, then the whole city, and the whole planet earth.
• See that all people, plants, and animals feel warm and happy.
• Send an extra dose of love light to those people I want to have a better connection to.

3. Visualize God:

I checked out two books on Loving Kindness from the library; the first is "The sacred Art of Lovingkindness; Preparing to practice," by Rabbi Rami Shapiro (2015). I've started this before, but I don't think I finished it. 

Rabbi Shapiro has outlined the 13 attributes of Lovingkindness, as described in Exodus, and has translated them into practices. These attributes are chanted in Jewish worship and are used for personal meditation.

The first two attributes, covered in Chapter One, are realizing the divinity of self, and realizing the divinity of others. Genesis says we are created in the image and likeness of God. "Being the image of God means that we are God manifest. ... God extended in time and space. ... Being the likeness of God means that we have the potential to act in a Godly manner. It means that we can ... engage each moment and each other with lovingkindness". 

The first practice is to visualize God as self and other. Following the general idea of this first practice, I will look in a mirror each morning, directly after my meditation practice, and see myself as the incarnation of God, remembering that God is not a being, but is BEING itself, in me, around me, and as me. Then I will extend that to include everyone  and everything, and acknowledge the intrinsic holiness of all things.

"There is a Jewish legend that says each of us has an angel who walks before us calling out, 'Behold the Image and Likeness of God'. You must honor your own angel and hear everyone else's angel as well".

This week, I will try to be more mindful of my Godliness. I'll try to touch in with this vision throughout the day, remembering that I am God, and that I can behave with loving kindness.

4. Speak little, listen much:

I'm also reading "Compassion is the Key to Everything; Find Your Own Path", by Alexandra Chauran (2016). She starts off by talking about the Golden Rule, to treat others as you want to be treated, and the imperative to "do no harm". When these two ideas are combined, and practiced to the best of your ability, you will experience spiritual bliss.

One of the first practices she describes is to learn to take turns with speaking and listening. She quotes a poem by Gwen Thompson: "Soft of eye and light of touch; speak little, listen much."

She describes active listening, which I've practiced before: Reading body language, paraphrasing, and all that. It's hard to do in the middle of an argument!