17/08/2023
What tone of voice do you speak to yourself in?
What kind of commentary do you give yourself?
About the way you look, your life, your worth…?
It’s important.
Sometimes it can be very sad to hear the way we speak to ourselves about ourselves, with a nasty critical voice.
More like an than a .
Then we flip into the other direction.
And we ‘put ourselves first’ with a militant defensive attitude which isn’t really being kind to ourselves either.
This is what the first stage of the Bhavana is about.
You could say it’s a priority and our duty as to learn how to develop and stabilise our self care/love.
For ourselves but just as importantly, for the sake of others.
It’s about strength and independence.
Both of which lead to clarity of vision.
The metta bhavana meditation is powerful.
It literally our life by going to the root of the matter.
We step in at the beginning and stop becoming victims of our own states.
The kindest people I’ve met seem to love themselves in a very straightforward healthy way.
Oddly enough you can practice Buddhism for a long time and never get down to fully loving yourself like that.
Someone who is genuinely kind to themselves is a rare creature. There is an ease in their being.
And obviously that and love doesn’t end at the borders of their skin.
It overflows into the lives of those around them.
Real love or metta is nothing sentimental or self indulgent.
It’s not narcissistic to actually love and care for your body and mind and feel directly connected to your life force and the life force around you.
We are simply developing into what calls the happy healthy human.
Of course, in secular society that is the end goal of life.
Interestingly, in Buddhism, the happy healthy human is just the beginning of the Path…
