garryageez's Journal

Jan 2007
4:10 PM GMT

Compassion and the practice of Metta. Some of the pictures in this item today depict scenes that may be distressing to people of a particularly sensitive nature. So dont view if you dont want to see. But I have included them, not to satisfy any kind of morbid curiosity but to show it as it is. I could have included many other war images but found them to be too disturbing. GARRYS VIEW: I feel we are all now suffering from the collective negative karma of our predecesors, The result of past actions are now coming to fruition and this is why our world is filled with so much hatred and confussion. It is now time for us Humans to turn our thinking around and start to make serious effort to purify this bad karma and this can only be done through right action. In general people have one common interest at heart and that is to be Happy. But many people are living the illusion that happiness is found through the pursuit of personal gain and the satisfaction of our bodily desires. It is time now for us to realise that true happiness and joy is within all of us. It is our own minds that create our own illusion and this clouds over our view of who we really are, and deprives us of true and lasting Happiness. All material and earthly things are impermanent and this is why they do not provide lasting satisfaction. Its like going on a great Holliday while we are there we feel great joy but when we have to return to normality we feel down. This happens to us all, all of the time and leads many people to depression. This is called the suffering of change. When we come to realise this we can begin to become free. Often people think that as an individual we can make no difference to the world situation, And it is this mode of thought that puts the greatest barrier in the way of progress. It is now time for all people to realise that making the world a better place begins with each one of us. If we all change our attitudes and learn to be more compassionate then the possitive change will begin to take place. To learn to feel greater compassion for our fellow beings, please try this Meditation technique. First sit down and think about all the bad things that have happened to you in your life, times when you have lost loved ones or have been hurt deeply by someone etc. As you begin to feel sad even maybe to the point of wanting to cry, hold this feeling and then realise that this common suffering is what we all experience in this world of constant change. Then think about Death and dying. This is a subject that most of us brush under the carpet throughout our lives, yet it is the only thing that is truly inevitable. We all know someone that we dont like very much, someone who may have mistreated us in the past, and we hold a very strong grudge towards them. But if we hear one day that they have died in a horrible way, we tend to think well I may not have liked this person very much but I wouldnt have wished this on anyone. This is compassion and it is present in everyone, some greater than others i do admit. But never the less it is still there. This feeling is like a seed within just waiting for the right conditions to grow, when we meditate in this manner and equalise others with ourselves and realise we are all in the same boat, our feelings of hate begin to subside making us more understanding towards one another causing better conditions for happiness for us all. It is also a good exercise to try and visualise people as they would have been when we where Babies. We all love Babies as they have not yet created the conditions without to cause others to dislike them. They are cute and cuddley and their vulnerability makes us want to pick them up and protect them. Now relise that we where all Babies once and that we are all still vulnerable to the ever changing nature of this world. In that sense we are all still little children of the world with very little control of the forces of nature that lift us up, pull us down and toss us from side to side in the tempest that is life. This is the practice of Metta (loving kindness) And is vital for us to not just practice during meditation but to incorporate within our daily lives and our relationships with others. With Metta Garry D.

Add comment

garryageez's Profile

Username: garryageez

Gender / Age: Male, 61

Location: United Kingdom