The Universal Language of Love
May 31, 2008We can't seem to avoid contact with ideas of separation. We see it through the body's eyes as we view one another in various colors and sizes, we hear it expressed in our unique languages and dialouges, even in simple daily chatter and all over the air waves---our five senses are only too quick to remind us of our differences. And it is so pervasive, that if we do not pause to become aware and conscious, we are often just caught up in it and easily succumb to its omnipotent control of our minds.
Still, this undeniable fact is tempered and balanced with an equally real truth. Consider the times when we experience our unity, when we are not so conscious of our differences but joined in our humanity. The times when we unite in deepest tragedy or jubilant celebration---what is the one element that accompanies our sorrow or happiness?
I was watching a news cast the other morning and while people were forming groups with lit candles to honor the end of one man's journey, a lovely sound of music formed the background for what we were viewing. I realized in that moment that music is everywhere when we are united; it creates invisible ties that bind us as one, it replaces any need for words, as words fail to capture the essence of the moments when we are in that space. It is profound caring and beauty and the love that relects our true nature. In that instant, when we are joined with and in music, there is only this moment, the only one that matters, precluding entry of any other, that we are together, we are one, we are united in the universal language of love.
None of My Business
May 29, 2008Sometimes I can not believe how long it is before I write and this morning I came to two conclusions. One is that I write all day long; it is my "job" on one hand as I complete projects, and I am also routinely writing within the context of my business in conducting seminars. This is not an excuse, but a reason that I find understandable.
But there may be an underlying cause for my hesitation in expressing myself in terms of an opinion or commentary of the day--it is that the older I get, the more I realize how little it all matters. What I think or you think about something really doesn't matter; it is just an opinion, nothing more than a thought we're having, and does not make any difference at all. </p>
<p>My very wise father was actually the first one who taught me to mind my own business and I think this is what he meant. This doesn't mean I won't continue to have thoughts and opinions nor experience strong feelings one way or another and choose to express myself, but now I am aware that they don't really mean anything. That way, too, I save myself the added grief that comes with getting way too serious and attached to things being one way or another. </p>
<p>Things are what they are and although they may not look or sound or feel good to me, I release myself from the thought that I need to change or control anything and that IS a very big deal. I also release anyone else with opinions that may have been intended to hurt me or perhaps put me down in some way because as Mark Twain once wrote, "Your opinion of me is none of my business." Now that's certainly a line that resonates! </P>
May today be a day that you and I live in the light of release and forgiveness:-)
The Giving of Forgiveness
March 21, 2008If you have been someone who has ever felt hurt or offended by another person, you know what it's like to forgive or not. Either way, there is a type of assumed power inherent in the act. If we choose forgiveness, then it may be that we feel rather good about our choice, there is virtue in it, a sense of unexpected giving. If we had decided to withhold our forgiveness, perhaps it is that we feel self-righteous and justifiable and in a way, naturally forgiven ourselves for being understood or agreed with in our pain.
But forgiveness is one of those words that gives us some trouble. We often hear that forgiveness may be granted without forgetting about the offense, but how can that be? Letting go from my point of view is letting it all go and never mind about the memory of it. That just holds you there---in the offense---in the past, which hurts everyone, so how can there be forgiveness without forgetting about it, moving on, getting over it, starting anew?
A dictionary would tell you that forgiveness means to pardon, excuse one, to seek neither punishment nor reparation, so if that’s true then what is the remembering about? Suppose that the events of mention are happening for me rather than to me?
I think that the best definition of forgiveness, the best expression of it, is not only to overlook, to let go and forget, but to change the way we view what people do in the first place. To look at what people do as nothing more than our interpretations or perceptions, opinions about what they do. And this opinion informs our offense and that is what actually causes us the pain. Without our thoughts about it, we simply have the behavior. There is no story; it just is.
The best gauge for whether something works or not is always the feeling we have left in the aftermath of the event and our response (or reaction) to the event. I have tried both ways and what I have found is that when I am willing to see it another way, to accept the fact that I create what I see by how I think about or frame something, then my choice is simple. Then the idea of forgiveness is applied to what I think someone else has done and now it is truly for me that I let it go. I become both possessor and bringer of peace by neither asking nor expecting the other to be or say or do anything different. How’s that for forgiveness?