Teacher Reflections: Opening the Heart

Charmaine Henderson

(Continued from the Newsletter)

. . . heart we can begin the formal practice of metta by asking for forgiveness from those we have hurt or injured and for ourselves for unskillful speech and actions and the harshness of the mind that judges. As we are ready we can extend forgiveness to those who have hurt and injured us. The practice of forgiveness unburdens the heart and invites a greater freedom to live with sensitivity and flexibility in the present. We can believe sometimes that forgiveness involves condoning certain behavior, ignoring harm or taking a particular action. Rather the process of forgiveness is a clearsighted recognition that holding onto resentments and grudges hurts us and that our fear of vulnerability can be met in other ways. Through practicing forgiveness we learn that when our hearts are closed to ourselves and others, we are the ones who suffer.

KINDNESS AND COMPASSION

Metta or kindness stems from seeing that just as we wish to be truly happy so all beings want to be happy and to have the causes of happiness in their lives. Compassion arises from a natural caring about pain, whether our own or the pain of others and the pain of our world. Compassion meets pain with love, with care and concern. As Stephen Levine teaches: “when your fear touches someone’s pain it is pity; when your love touches someone’s pain it is compassion.”

PRACTICE

These practices of the heart, forgiveness, kindness and compassion, encourage us to look at the intentions which inform our actions and to reflect before, during and after we speak and act about the motivation behind them. When we ask the root question about whether this act is kind we have the possibility of becoming free of habits of judging mind and comparing mind. When fear is met with kindness and compassion our relationship to the experience is transformed. The practice of mindfulness, of seeing clearly what is happening to us and within us with a nonjudgmental awareness, is possible only when we learn to look with kindness and caring, and when pain and difficulty are met with love.

Learning that the open heart is our true home is a process we can nurture through the practices of forgiveness, kindness and compassion in this very moment. How are we with the person who asks us for money on the subway, with the political figures we read about or watch online, with a call about a new diagnosis or the dying of a neighbor or friend? How are we when we have not done what we promised or have spoken harshly? Grandiose plans or ideas are not necessary. Rather what is called for is recognizing and allowing what is present to be met with an “affectionate curiosity” which weakens the habits of grasping and aversion and lightens the heart burdened with the habit of fear, whether it is the fear of losing what we have or the fear of not getting what we want or believe that we need. The practices of kindness and compassion exclude nothing, offering the possibility that each experience can be met with an open heart.

We will explore this remembering of “who we truly are” in a daylong retreat supported by the practices of forgiveness, kindness and compassion, ready to allow ourselves to be just where we are in meeting each experience that visits us. This retreat, Opening the Heart, is offered on Saturday, December 3rd from 10am to 5pm at the Center. All are welcome to attend.