These are concepts that you may meditate on, to help you develop your spiritual understanding, and to aid you in living a more harmonious life.
Everyone
has someone in their lives that they need to forgive.
Often there are many people. First, let us try to
understand the true meaning of forgiveness. When you
forgive, you are releasing pent up emotions. It is
not necessary for you to want good things for the person that you forgive. It is not even necessary for
you to tell them personally that they are forgiven. No,
what needs to be done is more of a healing, between
yourself and God. You release the negative emotions
you feel for this person.
This is best done in meditation. Relax yourself
and wait until you feel very comfortable and will not be disturbed. Begin with
a person you know needs your forgiveness. Think of
that person, visualize them. Just for a short time
allow yourself to feel the effects of what they did
to you. Then say, "I want to be released from what
this person has done to me." As you concentrate on
this statement, imagine the energy this person took
from you coming back. Once you feel lifted, as if
this has occured say, " I forgive you."
Now, if you can, feel compassion for this person.
Try very hard because this is quite necessary for
you to truly release the negative feelings. Let
us use an example. Say there was a man who was married
and he thought he was doing a very good job at being a husband. Then his wife told him she was miserable and
wanted a divorce. He asked, why I have done everything
I can to be the best husband possible. She says
something like I just want more. This makes no sense
to him but he goes ahead and grants her the divorce.
Soon he begins to feel resentful, he cannot understand
why, this happened. He had after all tried his best.
You see, from his point of view there was no justification for what was done to him. But the other
person, his wife in this instance, must have reasons
for what she did. There are always two sides of the
story. So the man can then try to imagine why his
wife had been unhappy. If he tried to look at the
situation from her point of view, he may be able to
come up with some understanding. Then he would be able
to give her compassion.
Naturally there are many many kinds of acts that need forgiveness. If someone did you great harm you will not be able to so easily forgive and let go. This is not to say that you cannot but it will take more effort. Remember the greater the hurt the greater the need to forgive.
As you practice this lesson of forgiveness allow all the people in your life to enter your meditaion. You will find that you can give forgiveness to people you didn't even realize needed it! Your parents, siblings, friends, boss, etc. Everyone who makes you mad in fact. Release all of it, see how good you feel. Also, is there someone who you feel you have done wrong to? If so, give yourself forgiveness, and try to imagine sending that person back their energy, thus creating a healing between the two of you.
When you meditate a good way to get a "deep connection" is by imagining yourself at the top of
a flight of stairs, then begin to walk down counting as you do 10, 9, 8, 7 and with each step you sink
deeper into relaxation. Then when you reach the
bottom of the stairs imagine yourself opening a door, a door that leads out of the darkness and into a bright sunny day. From here add whatever comes to the scene. Sometimes I go to a garden. other times a beach, or the mountains. Whatever inspies you.
Tolerance is a form of compassion. It is the ability to see the plight of others, and stop your own negative thinking about someone, or something. But, it is much more. Tolerance is patience in the face of adversity. To overcome ones fears and to trust that it is okay to believe in someone else. Even if that person is being less than civil. This stems from the belief that we are all one with God. To love God is to love yourself, and all others. It is difficult, for some myself included, to let down your guard in your dealings with others. This is not to say that you should ever trust someone unknown to you in a manner that would put you or your family in danger. You must always be mindful of your safety and really trust your intuition when it comes to people in general. Tolerance can be very difficult to obtain.
Let us say you have a family member who has had a turbulent life. Perhaps, they abuse drugs and alcohol, and when they are in the control of such substances they say or do hurtful things. Or, maybe you are agonizing over the fact that they are hurting themselves and all your efforts have been met with negation. What can you do? Nothing. Sometimes there is nothing you can do, but have tolerance. If you have tried, then you simply must wait for this person to want help. When a person with problems like alcohol and drug abuse wants help I believe it is important to not give up after that point, they need to re-connect with themselves and God, and that is not easy because they have been shut out for a long time. Do you see the importance of tolerance? It does not seem fair at times it is just the opposite, but the rewards to yourself for giving someone that kind of compassion and patience is immeasurable. Now let us focus on integrating tolerance into your life. In meditation imagine something or someone who irritates you, as you know this is a feeling of negativity so try to stop it as soon as you feel it. Immiediately think of the act of tolerance, nothing else just tolerating this person. Biting your tongue, taking a few deep breaths. Letting go of the irritation. Tolerance is the ability to perceive someone elses side of the matter. It is allowing for diversity. So, in your meditation imagine yourself doing just that. Allowing the other person to act as they do, but this time it does not affect you. It is likely the person will move along to annoy someone else, since you are no longer entertaining to them. People do all kinds of things that call for tolerance an example, taking your energy by starting an argument. When they see you are not interested, and they cannot steal any of your energy with their control games they too will move on.So, this lesson requires a lot of actual practice to really get it. Luckily, or not so, you will find that you get many opportunities in daily life to practice tolerance. Anyone who is a parent for example has constant tests put to them. Getting to work every day, commuting is definitely an exercise in tolerance. As I type this, I must have constant tolerance for my poor typing skills, that's no small feat believe me! All of these things are little but the little things are the killers so they are what you need to work on. Give yourself time with this one, celebrate every success. It's a tough one because there are so many occasions that you must be tolerant. Also,you are in the process of re-training your mind,and allowing for your heart to step in. Replacing negative responses with positive ones. These negative responses were taught to you by your parents, by society, t.v., movies, music. Patterns so deeply ingrained in your consciousness you are not aware of them. So have much tolerance for yourself, it is not easy! Always remember, the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. So do not expect a change overnight, this is a gradual process that will take much time. Be patient with yourself, love yourself, and enjoy your life.
This is really a rather easy lesson, but you must be honest with yourself. In meditation, bring up all of the hardships that you are presently going through. When I say 'hardship' I am referring to anything in your life that is difficult, seemingly hopeless, whether it be your health, finances, a loved one, an addiction whatever is bringing you down and separating you from your spiritual path. Hardships will do that, it is easy to blame God for the unfairness of it all. But do not lay blame so easily, try to work with it. Okay, identify your hardship(s). Now ask yourself, is there anything I can do to change these situations? You may be familiar with these words, change what you can change and accept what you cannot. This is what we need to do with our problems. Is there something you can do? If not you must accept this, and put the problem away for the time being. If the problem is something that is acute, like poverty or severely ill health, pray to God, and give it up to him. You see there are hardships that we are meant to endure, but we are never meant to suffer beyond are capacity. By asking for help you are sending the message out to the universe, and help will come back to you.
There will be other hardships that if you are truly honest with yourself are not indeed as bad as you think them to be. So, sort through your problems, identify which ones are the most troublesome and, ask for the help of God. As for the rest change what you can and accept what you cannot. To help you accept whatever hardships you should compare your problems to others who are in extreme hardship. Held up against such a harsh light I am sure you can understand hardship or at least your own a little better. Remember to use the lessons above as these are taught in sequence so that you can build upon what you have already learned.
After you have spent some time on the last lesson
you should try to set aside some time for reflection.
It is important when you are learning anything to
occasionally stop and reflect on what you have learned.
So, take
some time to reflect, and try to remember that you
are creating your future with todays thoughts and actions!
We have talked a lot of compassion, so now it is time to focus on it. When we talk of tolerance, compassion is often mentioned for you cannot have one without the other. However they are quite different. Tolerance is the act of enduring where as compassion is an actual feeling you give out to another individual. To have compassion you must first have an understanding of the oneness we all share. We are all one with God, and when you think of this it is easier to apply this lesson to your daily life.
We are here to follow our own path, but we can also assist others on their own along the way. Joining together with others also helps us in our spiritual growth. So it is to the betterment of all to reach out to as many people as you can, and with this practice makes perfect. Do not feel defeated if some people do not return your compassion, or if they refuse your attempts at kindness they are just at a different place right now, and perhaps later will see the true goodness of your intentions. Be patient and please, understand that this will take time. We all go back to our "old ways" from time to time. There is no need to feel defeat over this. It takes many years to get to a place where you automatically respond in a spiritual and loving manner during difficult times. Perhaps, no one really does all of the time. After all we are human and it is our nature to make mistakes. How else can we learn!
There comes a time in all of our lives when the good things stop happening and the bad things come piling on. All the work you have done seems like a fantasy, you feel as if the "real world" has taken back its claim on you. This is a time when you may want to give it all up and go back to your old ways. Tragedy, grief, heartbreak, any turmoil you may experience is clearly a human experience and not something spiritual or of growth potential. Or is it? It is in the times of our greatest struggles that our souls grow the most! These times are spiritual crossroads where we can choose to grow or to revert into our old ways. What may be difficult to accept is that real soul growth needs tragedy.
This is not to say that our souls do not grow in other ways. In fact our souls can grow from good and bad, happy times, as well as sad times. We grow when we feel the love we have for our children, or other special people in our lives. We grow from meditation, self-discovery. Life offers us many opportunities that we can benefit from every day. However, it is in those times of great pain that we grow in a very rapid and expansive way. These times are very hard, but from the perspective of the soul they are invaluable. Thus, when we are going through such times remember that it is a test of your spiritual strength and you must take everything you have learned and apply it.
I like to call these times "upheaval" of ones life.
It is when whatever has happened causes you to start
over. To re-build and even re-think your entire life.
Happily, these times do not occur often in our lives, but they can occur more or less depending on the
state of your life and spiritual development. Do not
feel alone, your soul is always with you. If you are
suffering the loss of someone you love they are
there with you as well. Do not ask why, because it does not matter, it just is. Accept whatever has happened and grow from it. Allow for
change and in a few months maybe you will see that
some good has come from it, even if it is just that
you have grown stronger.
To implement this into your daily life I suggest meditating or reflecting for at least 10-15 minutes each day. Once you still your mind, you will hear an answer to your questions. Once you listen to your heart, your soul will be able to guide you to your destiny. Remember life is constant change, do not resist this. Simply enjoy the ride, and know with everything that you are, that you are not alone.
These meditations are offered as a general direction you may go in. The important thing to remember is that we already know all of this...we only need to remember. Re-discover you, however you need to do it. God bless.
