This Monday April the 2nd Mick will facilitate. He shares:
Mindfulness practice is a path to the heart. In stillness, and in silence, we traverse this path to come closer to the heart. We approach the protective outer layer and notice where and how the heart is closed. We notice
and feel the softness and the spots where we can open to let ourselves and others into our heart. So many of the holdings of the heart and the hard places have been built around regrets and resentments. As we give ourselves the gift of stopping, the gift of coming closer to ourselves to develop mindfulness of feelings, there comes a yearning to let go. In his book, Healing Into Life And Death, Stephen Levine shares:
It is in passing through the holdings around the heart that the power of forgiveness becomes most evident. Forgiveness allows us to let go of the curtains of resentment, the filters to life that have kept us so lost in the mind. Forgiveness softens the clinging and allows our holdings to sink a bit more deeply into the healing heart.
Following Levine's guidance in a meditation on Forgiveness we can
"Begin to reflect for a moment on what the word "forgiveness" might mean. What is forgiveness? What might it be to bring forgiveness into one's life, into one's mind?" As with all of our mindfulness practices, we start where we are. We begin by slipping into the cracks of the heart to soften just this much. The practice of cultivating forgiveness opens us to releasing our own suffering and to looking deeply into all suffering. The practice of cultivating forgiveness is a practice of loving-kindness and healing. Thich Nhat Hanh says that, "Understanding is the practice of looking deeply." When we forgive, we don't condone despicable acts or everyday slights, but we do open a bit more to look deeply with some understanding of the causes and conditions around words and actions. We open our life, our mind, our heart, a bit more.
This Monday night during our second sitting we will do a forgiveness practice. This practice traditionally involves extending forgiveness to someone who we have some resentment toward. Then you picture someone who is unforgiving toward you, and reach out with an openness to be forgiven. Lastly, you offer forgiveness to yourself to soften self-judgment and to enliven kindness.
Forgiveness, healing, dissolving long standing issues and clinging. I look forward to our exploration together.
"The holding around the unresolved, the unapproached has become so cramped close that it seems to take considerable effort to soften it back to its natural openness. But forgiveness acts almost as a kind of lubricant to allow the yet held to slip lightly away".
----Stephen Levine
I look forward to our time together.
Mick