Can I look at a picture to clear my mind?

When we look at a picture our sense organ is active. Our eyes cannot visualize anything without the involvement of our mind. So when we are looking at a picture, we are engaging our mind. As a temporary solution, it is better than having our mind go in 10 different direction. However, ultimately, we want to train our mind to be quiet. Our mind should take instructions from us – which is not happening right now. So this whole exercise is about training the mind.

Loving Kindness

Let’s talk about Loving Kindness today. It is a phrase that originates from the Sanskrit word “Maitri”. In Pali language it was called “Metta”. Loving Kindness practice is used to develop wishes for unconditional goodwill towards the object of the wish.

“I Want Everything For You and Nothing From You” that is loving-kindness. I believe Rumi may have said that phrase.

Qualities that facilitate the development of Loving Kindness include such qualities as being non-deceptive, sincere, easy to correct, gentle and without arrogance.

Why Loving Kindness? A peaceful world requires peaceful people. Angry people cannot bring peace. I am amazed when otherwise peaceful people are so agitated that they start violent acts in the name of demanding peace.

Ways we can develop Loving Kindness include patience, generosity, inclusiveness, forgiveness and playfulness.

Loving Kindness meditation is an intentional wish for other living beings to be happy.

So, we start by bringing attention to ourselves and contemplate:

May I be happy; may I be loved; may I be free from misery; may I be joyful.

Then we think of a person who is closest to us and contemplate:

May you be happy; may you be loved; may you be free from misery; may you be joyful.

Next, we think about someone who is not as close to us and contemplate:

May they be happy; may they be loved; may they be free from misery; may they be joyful.

And lastly, we think about all living beings and contemplate:

May we be happy; may we be loved; may we be free from misery; may we be joyful.

I wish I spent more time with my family

Most people who are near death almost always express the above sentiment. Why not start today? If we know we are going to die someday, let’s start spending as much time as we want with our families. Your circumstances may not allow you to spend all the time with them, but if we gradually increase the time we spend with our family 2 hours more per week and that will only increase to 4 hours more per week and so on. Point is that we all need to start living today rather than waiting for someday! Let’s start our journey.

Death

I wanted to talk about something we try to avoid talking as a society. Death. When one is born, there is only one certainty in this world. Every living being that is born will eventually die. There is no question about it. It is the only guarantee one can provide in life. There is no guarantee one will be healthy or wealthy or will find love etc. But we all die. Although death is this certainty, we are never willing to accept that as a fact of life – especially in the western world. Another thing about death is that it is uncertain as to timing. As we are talking, I may stop breathing and die right here. Intellectually we know that we may die someday. But we think that day is not going to be today. We go on about our lives as if we may not die today. Our default mode is that I may not die today. How about we look at this just a little differently? How about we change our default mode to I may die today. That does not mean we will die today but just as it says, we may die today. We may not die today, but we may. If someone gives us a date certain let’s say one week for now; we will die for sure. How will that change our day to day decisions? Will we worry about someone who cut us off in traffic? Will we worry about small things that we argue about with our friends and families? Let’s contemplate that and see how we can change our decisions based on the fact that we may die today.