Becoming instruments of compassion

The purpose of our spiritual practice is to return again and again to the moment, realising that all phenomena are impermanent. In my experience, when we return to the moment, we begin to taste sacred awareness... the mindfulness, compassion, and calm abiding that arise from beginning to see that moment more clearly. There is no struggle to be perfect, because all we have to work with is this moment... not the past... not the future. This moment. As we taste that sacred awareness of the moment, we experience a more complete joy than we've ever experienced before. And we can then begin to bring that joy with us, transforming the lives of those we touch.

The Dharma compels us toward a mindfulness that nothing is ever gained in our conflicts with others. The ego may be fooled into believing that we gain esteem and recognition by “being right” or “winning the battle”, but the path of conflict is one strewn with the effects of fear: anxiety, unbalance, hostility and pain.

When one becomes mindful of the call for compassion, loving-kindness, non-violence and respect for all beings, then the desire for peace outweighs the need to be “right”. Seeing our interactions with others as an opportunity to gain insight into the perspective of another manifestation of the Beloved allows the healing energy of love to replace those spaces in which fear crept. And when we encounter someone who is caught up in the ego-drama of needing to be right themselves, we can gently walk away from the conflict. A fire without oxygen soon flickers-out. So too does the desire for conflict without opposition.

The Missionary Sisters of Charity begin each day by reciting the well-known “Prayer of St. Francis”, written by an anonymous Franciscan friar in 1912. I close today’s reflection by offering a translation of the prayer, as found in “Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions”, a book published by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA Services), in Chapter 11 of that book:

(M)ake me a channel of thy peace;
that where there is hatred, I may bring love;
that where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness;
that where there is discord, I may bring harmony;
that where there is error, I may bring truth;
that where there is doubt, I may bring faith;
that where there is despair, I may bring hope;
that where there are shadows, I may bring light;
that where there is sadness, I may bring joy.

(G)rant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted;
to understand, than to be understood;
to love, than to be loved.

For it is by self-forgetting that one finds.
It is by forgiving that one is forgiven.
It is by dying that one awakens to eternal life.

I once read something that Aung San Suu Kyi -- the leader of the Burmese democracy movement -- said upon winning the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize:

“You know, I am a Buddhist. As a Buddhist the answer is very simple and clear. That is compassion and mercy is the real panacea. I am sure that, when we have compassion and mercy in our hearts, we can overcome not only terrorism, but many other evil things that are plaguing the world.”

May we start this new day mindful of that wonderful admonishment. And may we be instruments of compassion.

Namasté!
-- dharmacharya gurudas sunyatananda

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