Deep bows to your good hearts, your Buddha Nature.
Deep bows to your good hearts, your Buddha Nature.
It is wild plum blossom spring here in California, snowy winter in the heartland and perennial summer with weekly rainbows on Maui. I returned last week from Maui, writing and resting, and joyfully visiting with my old friend Ram Dass. A small group of us “spiritual” folks went to join RD at his house to watch the Super Bowl – lots of excitement and laughter. Being from Boston, Ram Dass rooted for the Patriots. Oh well.
A couple of weeks later RD and I did a telecast together, including a teaching on the Wise Heart. Because of his major stroke 15 years ago, Ram Dass’s eloquent and poetic speech is now slow and limited. And so he has dropped down from his brilliant mind to his heart. And what a big heart – he’s all love. He says he loves everybody (his altar has some of the most disagreeable political figures next to portraits of dozens of his favorite saints). He says he loves it all, people, trees, houses and trash, bankers and yogis, organic food and garden pests, birth and death, joy and sorrow.
What is wisdom anyway, if not also love? We talked about how, when we remember, we can so easily tap into loving awareness, wisdom itself. Spaciousness. Vastness. Mystery.
It is one deep breath away. Feel the vastness even now as you read these words. With a single spacious breath the mind can quiet, the heart can soften, we can become loving awareness. We can hold the sorrows of the world in compassion and offer love without measure to the incandescent beauty of reality.
These are the Buddha’s instructions:
“With a heart full of love, continuously pervade the whole wide world, above, below, everywhere around with loving wishes, abounding, sublime, beyond measure.”
Try it. You will be glad you did! Blessings, Jack
Such a welcome reminder, coming at a time of deep sadness, mixed in with fear and anger, re the results of the Mexican presidential election on July 1st. Suffering is going to increase in this beleaguered land. As a US citizen, I cannot act politically in my adopted country, but I hope to offer a compassionate heart to my friends and neighbors (no matter how they voted).
Hi Jack, seems like we in the west enjoy using the term “namaste.” I wonder if people not from here ever bow and use western/southern colloquialisms such as “how y’all doin’ etc.