Poema Bela
By: A six-year-old
“It’s sad to say good-bye.
It’s sad to say hello.
But it’s good to be the person that I am.”
Drop the hurt and dive for Freedom
When we are young, our minds are open and our hearts are big, and we can forgive and let go much easier. We don’t take ourselves too seriously, we don’t have a strong preference of who we are. As we grow older and gain status and comfort, our mental attitudes might change without much recognition from ourselves. It becomes harder to forgive and stay open. We might abandon the process of examining the status quo of our beliefs and our default emotional state.
After gaining a stable social status and a comfortable life, I noticed that my mind shrank significantly. I became judgmental and closed to new people and experiences. I could only be friends with people who had similar background and views. I considered myself a sophisticated modern woman while I was just getting further and further away from myself.
I was not happy at all with that change and searched for answers. Through the practice of Harmony Meditation I learned how I can stay open in my mind and warm in my heart despite the challenges. It does take courage and willingness to look deeper and see myself without embellishments. A discipline of applying critique to my own self can be excruciating. It is easy to blame the other party and close the subject. With practice, the process of exploring becomes much less traumatic. At times I am able to chuckle at myself – what the heck am I doing? At times I even look forward to receiving a not-so-pleasant feedback from my teacher because I know and trust the process. I know that when I weather the internal storm of a hurt ego with a right attitude, a new beginning will come. And that feels like a miracle – what a great potential each of us hold.
“In our lives we can free ourselves if we realize that we have not one way to choose, not two ways to choose, but we can choose all possible ways.” – Johwa Choi.
In a conflict situation, I try to apply the teaching before plunging the sword of judgment and declaring myself right and the other party wrong. I know the answer is almost never black and white, and there is something to learn for me. By admitting that my worldview can be limited and flawed, I open myself to new possibilities and freedom.
Acting myself – more than an Oscar-worthy performance
Around the time of the Oscars I realized that I actually spend a considerable amount of time acting instead of living my life. I constantly try to meet expectations and to be what, I think, is expected of me in my role as a senior manager aspiring to the executive level.
However, if I am not acting as my real self, I feel like a fake and like I am just being an actor in a role. I feel like I am pretending to be something or somebody, which has nothing to do with me. If I am not aware of who I really am, I am apart of myself and I am not really alive. In turn, if I keep my awareness about my real self, I feel good about myself, I feel at home and at peace with being me. This is when I am thoughtful and make the better decisions.
After reading chapter 7 of ‘Harmony Meditation’ by JoHwa Choi, however, I realized that there is another perspective though that I had not considered yet. By keeping the awareness about myself, I can fill this role or any role without acting it! Any role becomes just another facet of myself and one of many ‘mes’ that comprises the real me. If I act my true nature having true love in my heart I can be all these without being a fake.
My teacher pointed out that I tend to aiming too low. I can see now how I am limiting myself and others through this behavior. To aim higher, I no longer need to act, I can be the real me in any role – so it is no longer a role.
These many ‘mes’ then become reflections of my real self, and I keep switching between them during my life’s journey as I adapt to change, letting me come closer to my goal and becoming my Self.
Love, Interrupted
‘Cause love is the answer
It’s the answer to the questions in your mind
Love is the answer
It’s the answer, if you’re looking you will find
How to love without attaching? I don’t remember since when I started asking myself that question. What is the difference and how can I tell? Why should I desire it? The moments of experiencing the “bigger than self” love were rare. Once at a college party I felt a sudden outbreak and outpouring of love to my friends and everyone around. Another time I met a person I loved and hated for so long, and realized that there is still different kind of love deep inside me despite all the accumulated drama. If we don’t pay close attention, we forget these moments easily, and chase after strong emotional feelings of love.
Having an inquisitive scientific mind, I could not find a satisfactory answer to the origin of these moments. These moments were special because I knew they could not possibly come from my own self, from my usual “scrutinizing everything” self. This feeling of love was so big and absolute, without limits. Or gentle and true, omnipresent.
I could not rest without knowing the answer. I kept pondering – how can I reproduce the feeling? What internal and external factors can I change to increase the probability of having this love a regular guest in my life?
Love is so confusing. Love is widely misunderstood. In the book “Harmony Meditation: A new way to completion” my teacher talks about a MuAh centered love, a bigger kind of love. He also talks about summer-like, spring-like, and winter-like love. One of the major sources of confusion about love is that we rarely acknowledge winter-like love. It takes time and wisdom to recognize it. We tend to put higher importance on the love we did not get enough of. If our parents were always strict, we would desire the emotional love and try to give the abundance of that love to our kids. The type of love we crave the most also defines the kind of partner we attract in love relationships.
Emotional love without a strong base, though, comes with a price tag. It is nearly impossible to figure out what is the exact right amount of emotional love, and the party sharing that love in abundance can’t help but feeling depleted from time to time. It creates of habit of dependence in the receiving party and prevents them from going deeper and looking for their own source of love.
The winter-like love is calm and trusting. It believes in the process of learning, and it trusts that the other person will overcome the challenges on his or her own. It does not try to control every step of the way. It keeps that everlasting love continuously, uninterrupted, without the need for recognition from the other party. It teaches the principles, not techniques. It teaches how to get to the source of one’s own love, creativity, power. Recovering and growing that unconditional love is much harder than expressing emotional love. It may take years of practice. Is it a goal worth striving for? Absolutely.
I was babysitting a child who was a bit cranky. He started crying for no apparent reason and after trying to cheer him up I left him alone. I was watching my own emotions. My standard response would have been – he is bad, he is unreasonable, I should just leave him alone. Then I reminded myself of bigger love and suddenly I realized I don’t have to judge him as good or bad, I don’t have to fight against his sad emotions with my angry emotions. I don’t need to close myself off either. I can just tell him his choice is bad, but it does not make him bad, he can always change his choice. And I can continue sharing my love with him. If my love is expansive enough, I can easily do this. What a feeling of freedom, WHEW! Practicing Harmony Meditation is absolutely worth of this state of awakened and conscious love. I still have a long way to go to keep that love every single moment no matter what.
What happened with the boy? He stopped crying. If you can remember yourself as a child, crying takes a lot of energy, and is utterly exhausting. I congratulated him on the good choice he made, smiled brightly, and we carried on with playing and having fun.
What Your Hands Deserve
http://www.freegreatpicture.com/cat/photo-30752
Take a good look at your hands. After all, where would you be without them? What would you wish for in place of them? They are there and yours to do with what you wish. Could you imagine a better tool at your disposal?
Now that you remember how precious they are, let us continue to revive our appreciation for them. Wiggle each finger independently of one another for a minute. Notice the bones and joints and how they all function together. Then, open your palms wide and stretch your fingers out and apart for a short time. Afterward, let your hands rest and relax. Say, “Thank you!” to them and give them a long deserved break.
Now that your hands rest, what will you do and for how long will you allow yourself to do that?