Kotsu Kotsu

I have long believed that we pretty much construct the world we live in from our  thoughts .  I can't blame people brought up in an objective materialist tradition for thinking that sounds kind of "New Age-y." It makes a certain amount of sense that if you mistrust people, they will mistrust you in return, and vice versa. But constructing your entire reality? Bah! OK. It's just a theory and I'm testing it through personal observation. So, here's one experiment: "If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion." - Dalai Lama For a while I have been working on compassion by noticing my negative thoughts about others and...well... substituting alternate thoughts . I have a lot of thoughts about others that I definitely would not want to share. Certain situations are really fertile for nasty thoughts: trying to find a parking space; in line in the grocery store; in the changing room of Target...S...

"A human being is part of a whole, called by us 'Universe,' a part limited in time and space. He (sic) experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty." -Albert Einstein

What if, just for a moment, you imagined that everyone in the world was actually part of you? Maybe some part of your psyche, that you had perhaps neglected or forgotten, to a greater or lesser degree. Let yourself explore this thought, ranging over the people in your life, the ones you care for and the ones you don't, the ones you know better and less well, the ones you find approachable or difficult, weird, stupid, wise, frightening, thinking of them as a part of yourself, therefore worthy of your forgiveness and compassion. If, as in this little thought experiment, we approached all other humans as if they were a neglected part of ourselves, think how the world would change!

Here's the Dalai Lama's Facebook post today: "Education and knowledge by themselves do not bring inner peace to individuals, families or the society in which they live. But education combined with warmheartedness, a sense of concern for the well-being of others, has much more positive results. If you have a great deal of knowledge, but you're governed by negative emotions, then you tend to use your knowledge in negative ways. Therefore, while you are learning, don't forget the importance of warmheartedness." How often do I try to "impart some knowledge" to someone, and end up feeling frustrated by the lack of receptivity! Taking a step back to begin with warmheartedness and caring can change the interaction completely!

I recently read an article called something like, "10 Reasons to Avoid a Yoga or Pilates Teacher." In it the author described various "no-nos" that supposedly should make you think twice about training with someone. Since this is not intended as a critique of the article, I'm not going to link to it.) In reading the article I had two reactions.  The first is that even the most fantastic teachers will admit to having committed every grievous teaching error in the book at some point. Beginning teachers in particular are unlikely to know a lot about anatomy, may rely on language that they don't really think about that has been passed down from their teachers, may turn their backs on students, or don't always have the answer as to why you are doing a particular movement. But they may still be great teachers. So a list of "teaching mistakes" doesn't seem to be sufficient reason to avoid a teacher. What I look for most in a teacher is com...