A personal blog by a graying (mostly Anglo with light African-American roots) gay left leaning liberal progressive married college-educated Buddhist Baha'i BBC/NPR-listening Professor Emeritus now following the Dharma in Minas Gerais, Brasil.
Whatever you intend,
whatever you plan, and whatever you have a tendency toward, that will
become the basis on which your mind is established. (SN 12.40) Develop
meditation on lovingkindness, for when you develop meditation on
lovingkindness, all ill will will be abandoned. (MN 62)
Lovingkindness is like a mother who has a baby boy, for she just wants him to grow and thrive. (Vm 9.108)
Reflection
The image of a
mother with a newborn child is used often in early Buddhist literature
to help envision and define the emotional state of lovingkindness. While
this might involve some idealization, the point is that this emotion
can be viewed as natural, pure, and spontaneous. It is a caring for
another that is not rooted in our own self-interest and not entangled
with an exchange. Lovingkindness is just wanting the best for someone
else.
Daily Practice
See what it
feels like to regard all people as your newborn child, to look on all
situations with the same benevolence you might extend to an infant and
to cultivate a non-specific wish for all beings to be healthy, safe, and
profoundly well. Lovingkindness is a quality of heart and mind that can
be cultivated, and by doing so you transform “the basis on which your
mind is established.” In short, you become a more caring person.
Tomorrow: Refraining from False Speech One week from today: Cultivating Compassion
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