Fresh Start: an opportunity to start over without prejudice

2013 is around the corner. With it’s arrival comes the opportunity (a favorable or advantageous circumstance or combination of circumstances) for a fresh start. If you want to choose that path.

The tradition of making a New Year’s resolution is 4,000 years old! Ancient Babylonians made promises to start the New Year off on the right foot in order to earn the favor of the Gods. The “New Year” wasn’t always observed in January because a month called “January” didn’t always exist! It originally was the Spring Equinox celebration. Spring being a natural time to think of fresh starts, beginning anew. Throughout history different “leaders” have changed it from one date to another. Many religions and cultures still celebrate a different date for the New Year.

I think many of us would chuckle thinking about resolutions we have made and kept! My record isn’t very good!

However, this year it really struck me what the potential might be, if we could make changes that would provide a fresh start to parts of our lives. What if we took advantage of this quaint custom and did turn it into an opportunity?

Recent events have led many of us to reevaluate all kinds of things. Personally I found myself thinking deeply about living more in the present and letting go of past angers, disappointments, and focusing more on simply being kind.

While I still hope to “give up” a few things, I have decided to focus on “doing”.

My priority this year is to be kind. In big ways and small ways.

“Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.”

Dalai Lama

I don’t think there is a skill to being kind. It’s in all of us. It may be buried, or other responses and actions might be stronger, but it is in us.

I have been working on kindness a little bit this year. I have had some successes, but many more surprises.  I am always surprised how quickly I respond with frustration to things beyond my control. That frustration is a form of anger. I can feel my body change when it surfaces. When my body changes because my mind changes, it all becomes a spiral of downward momentum. Then I have a difficult time getting free from it.

Hand in hand with being kind comes being present and being in the here and now, not in the past or future. And that is even harder. I carry disappointments, frustrations, worries from work home with me every day. Sometimes it takes me days to digest them and let them go. I am always thinking and planning one step ahead so I am “prepared”. How can that be bad? Being prepared? But somehow it does fuel the anxiety. If I am being kid to myself, which is the first step to be kind to others, why do I worry, become anxious over things that I have managed to take care of for years and know they are not a big deal? Is it all in the wording……the wording my mind chatter loops endlessly around in my head? Why can’t it just be: “I will stop at the grocery store.”, rather than: “I have to stop at the grocery.”  Have to, have to, have to, have to. I will focus on making statements with little or no value regarding things that are……no good or bad, no judgement. Just a fact. By adding the word “have” it becomes a chore or burden.

So I will focus on being present in this one moment. I will be kind, kinder, kindly. I will begin with myself. I will change the mind chatter in my head. I will reach out to others and simply be kind. This is a New Year, a fresh start. I have this opportunity to start over, and allow the kindness that is already inside of me be stronger and more present.

“What We Are Asked To Do Is Love” ~ Thomas Merton

 

“Our job is to love others without stopping

to inquire whether or not they are worthy.

That is not our business,

and in fact, it is nobody’s business.

 What we are asked to do is love,

and this love itself will render both ourselves 

and our neighbors worthy, if anything can.”

Thomas Merton

As we gather together in the soft darkness of the Solstice we are reminded there are rhythms and cycles that move without thought to us humans. As we embrace  families and friends singing out greetings of peace and Faith, let us also remember we have a calling to love one another, every single person, without stopping. There is no pausing to regard if they are worthy.

What we are asked to do is love.

There is a lot of talk and thoughts about those who have, and those who have not, those who are  deserving, and those who are not, those who are “good” and those who are “bad”, those who are “right” and those who are “wrong”. In amongst all that, it feels sometimes that we have lost the capacity to love, to accept, to help heal, to forgive and to be tolerant and have decided to walk  instead with fear, mistrust,  isolation, apathy.

What we are asked to do is love.

“We do not exist for ourselves.” Thomas Merton

“The whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness of the interdependence of all these living beings, which are all part of one another, and all involved in one another.” Thomas Merton

I certainly struggle with this. But, I struggle more with the thought of violence, of turning a blind eye, of pretending to know which is the one, right path.

This is the time of year when many of us turn inward. A time of reflection. Also, a time of looking forward. Many customs of the Solstice and New Year include a letting go of the past and a cleansing of the heart and spirit for the future.  While we can never be sure of the future, we can, and this moment, open up our hearts and love. It’s not our business to judge. Everyone struggles and falls. What we are asked to do is love. At this moment.

http://www.merton.org/chrono.aspx

 

 

The Astonishing Light Of Your Own Being

“One day the sun admitted
I am just a shadow.
I wish I could show you
The infinite incandescence
That has cast my brilliant image!
I wish I could show you,
When you are lonely or in darkness,
The Astonishing Light
Of your own Being!”
Hafiz

“Namaste” is a word derived from Sanskrit meaning “I bow to you”.  Now a days we seem to tranlate the meaning as “the light in me honors the light in you.”

And there it is again: the light in you. “The astonishing light of your own being”.

Sometimes it is hard for us to see, feel, understand or acknowledge our own light that shines deep within us. When we are feeling alone, lost, sad, confused, this light may seem to fade. It really hasn’t faded….our vision is only clouded a little.

When the greeting “Namaste” is given to another,  the hands are together over the heart, and the body bends or bows in respect to the one receiving the greeting. It is a very humbling salutation and motion. In our current society, we really do not ever do this…bow to someone. It is a very simple action that holds great power and possibility. It creates a chain reaction that, for a moment, reminds us that this other person in front of us is of importance and value.

I think we also need to consider bowing to ourselves as a means of reminding ourselves that this “astonishing light within us”, as Hafiz calls it, is of extraordinary brilliance and beauty.  And even the Sun, were it able to speak, would say “I am but a shadow cast by your brilliance”.

Honor the light within others and within yourself today.

Namaste.