Training In Joy

[Guest guest]

Dear Miss Kanti

 

Thank you for this beautiful message of Fearless Life

 

DharmaDev Arya

thunderheals <thunderheals

<>

Saturday, December 21, 2002 2:34 PM

Training In Joy

 

 

An Excerpt from the Book, "Places that Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness"

by

Pema Chodron....

 

"How do we discover our inherent clarity and compassion? How do we develop

trust that openess is available even in the most frantic moments? When we

feel left out,

inadequate, or lonely, can we take the spiritual warrior's perspective and

contact our inner compassion?

 

Sharing the heart is a simple practice that can be used at any time and in

any situation. It enlarges our view and helps us remember or

interconnectedness. It is a method for enhancing our ability to rejoice.

 

The essence of the practice is that when we encounter pain in our life we

breathe into our heart with the recognition that others also feel this. It's

a way of acknowledging when we are closeing down and of training to open up.

When we encounter any pleasure or tenderness in our life, we cherish this

and

rejoice. Then we make the wish that others could also expereince this

delight

or relief. In a nutshell, when life is pleasant, think of others. When life

is a budrden, think of others. If this is the only mind training we ever

remember to do, it will benefit us tremendously and everyone else. It is a

way of bringing whatever we encounter onto the path of awakening our

compassion.

 

When we practice in ths way, we don't bypass our own pleasure. Say we are

eating a delicious strawberry. We don't think, :"Oh I shouldn't be enjoying

this so much. Other people don't even have a crust of bread." We just

appreciate fully the luscious

fruit. Then we wish that Pete or Rita could have such pleasure. We wish that

anyone who is suffering could experience such delight.

 

Discomfort of any kind also becomes the basis for practice. We breathe

knowing that our pain is shared; ther are people all o ver the earth feeling

just as we do right now. If we want, we can go further. We can wish that a

specific person or all beings could be free of suffering and its causes. IN

this way toothaches, our insomnia, our divorces, and our terror become our

link with humanity.

 

A woman wrote me about practicing with her daily misery in traffic. Her

resentment and her uptightness, the fear of missing an appoinment, had

become

her herat connection with all the other people fuming in their cars. She'd

begun to feel her kinship with people all around her and to even to look

forward to this daily "practice."

 

This simple way of training with pleasure and pain allows us to use what we

have, wherever we are, to connect with other people. It engenders on the

spot

bravery, shich is what it will take to heal ourselves and our brothers and

sisters on the planet.

 

''To make things as easy as possible to understand,

we can summerize all teachings into the phrase "a kind

heart". Just train yourself to have a kind heart always

and in all situations."

- Paltrul

Rinpoche