The
summer seems to have flown by. For
me this summer has been full of activity, and I have been away a lot. I was blest with a very good two week
meditation retreat, and recently I was able to spend a week with my dear
grandsons.
When
I stay with my daughter and son-in-law, I like to get up early before the rest
of the family and meditate, but my youngest grandson, five year old Kai, is
also an early riser. One morning I
was sitting on the bed on a pillow in a full lotus pose when I heard little
footsteps on the stairs. The door
to my room slowly opened as I kept my eyes closed in meditation. Kai slipped quietly into the room and
climbed up on the bed next to me.
He assumed the pose he had seen by Rafiki, the wise mandrill (baboon) in
The Lion King.
I
asked him if he knew what he was doing.
“Yes,” he said, “I’m meditating with you.” “What is meditation?” I asked him. He said that it was the way he was sitting. So we engaged in a conversation about
how to sit. I told him about the
four silences: silent spine – sitting with the back straight and still; silent
hands – lying still on the thighs or in the lap; silent eyes – lids closed and
still; and silent tongue – the tongue remaining still in the mouth. Then I said that the only thing we have
to do then is to watch the breath, just keep watching the breath. We sat in silence with great stillness,
simply being without doing. He got
it. After about five minutes Kai
announced, “I’m done. Let’s go
have breakfast.”
The
Dalai Lama is quoted as having said, “If every eight year old in the world is
taught meditation, we will eliminate violence from the world within one
generation.” This is an interest
thought. What is it about
meditation that would make it an antidote for violence? Well, if we look at the Prayer of the
Lamb we can see how that could become possible. “Yeshua/Jesus, Lamb of God, have mercy on us.” The more we meditate with this prayer,
or the more we may come to see that I cannot pray for myself in isolation or
for you without including myself.
We are in relationship. And
then when we come to see that this abundant and spontaneous mercy
unconditionally flows to all regardless of worthiness, we are better able to
recognize how my need for mercy is of the same nature as your need for
mercy. The distance between
persons is shortened. Life becomes
more intimately shared. The idea that
another could be an enemy or a competitor becomes less and less tenable. The need for violence and the desire
for it reduce, and the other becomes a much more interesting and appealing
person. Compassion replaces fear.
So
keep on meditating. Until this mercy
and love of God become an experienced reality for us, we need to make good use
of this excellent spiritual resource of meditation practice. Practice is the word. Practice, practice, practice. Keep on meditating.
Beverly
