I am grateful this evening for the teachings I’ve received on mindfulness meditation through the East Bay Meditation Center in Oakland. What I’ve learned since I first began attending events and classes at EBMC last July has been invaluable to me as I navigated the rough waters I experienced during my year of living dangerously in 2011. The teachings of the dharma–the Four Noble Truths, the Eightfold Path, the Four Limitless Qualities, as well as the practice of mindfulness meditation have all been immensely valuable to me, providing a framework on which I’ve been able to build my recovery and bouncing back process. Meditating and offering metta or lovingkindness numerous times throughout the course of a week helps me to stay focused on what’s good by wishing well to myself and others. At least once per day I offer several phrases of well-wishing that are fashioned after the buddhist concept of metta. These are variations I’ve learned from various teachers some of which I’ve tweaked the words a little bit.
May I/you/we be peaceful and happy. May I/we/you be safe and protected from harm. May I/we/you be healthy and strong in body, mind and spirit. May I/we/you live with joy, ease, and wellbeing.I also add other phrases about compassion–for oneself and others–and still others about equanimity as time and inclination allow. It is a bit like a prayer and I find that offering metta, focusing requests for the good of all beings everywhere, helps calm me at times when I might otherwise be a bit anxious. I have a ways to go and a lot more to learn to develop a consistent meditation practice, but I am hopeful I’ll continue working in that direction.
Today has felt like another long day and after a very active day at the Berkeley Food Pantry I am tired. In keeping with my new stated goal of getting more rest each night than I have been, I will close tonight’s blog much sooner than usual. I’ve already nodded off a few times with my laptop balanced gently on my lap, my fingers stilled on the keyboard (it’s amazing how many G’s one can squeeze onto two lines when one falls asleep pressing the key.) So I will take my rest. May we all be free from suffering and the causes of suffering. And may we all be happy and experience the causes of happiness. So be it!
