Dear Ones,
I was recently enjoying a meditation on the Chani astrology app, when her words called to mind and heart my gratitude for your companionship–as a friend, care-giver, contemplative community member, directee, mentee, mentor, teacher, etc. I’m fortunate and grateful in so many ways for your presence in my life and in the life of the community we co-create.
The meditation is so beautiful, I’m including some of it here:
Who has blessed you and protected you with their love for you?
Feel how the people, the animals, the beings in your life bless you, protect you, and wrap you up energetically with their love.
Feel how every prayer that someone has prayed for you, every good wish that someone has wished for you, every good word that someone has said on your behalf, and every act of generosity that someone has offered you, has contributed to your prosperity, your abundance, your blessings, and your protections, in this life.
Feel from how many sources it comes to you. Imagining all of the little kindnesses that you don’t even know about surrounding you.
Feel how, beyond the physical realm, the beings, the spirits–you might say angels–that have your best intentions in heart and in mind, also bless you with this affection, this love, these wishes for you, like a kind of energetic glitter that surrounds your aura, that surrounds and surpasses this space that you inhabit in this moment.
The teachers, the elders, the ancestors that want more for you than you want for yourself.
And beyond that, the great creative spirit that moves through all things wants you to experience
this abundance,
and be a channel for these blessings.
And to be someone who offers this kind of love and affection and protections to others: to all beings in your life–to all those that are in your circle, your care, and your community.
Chani Nicholas, Protection
Community Offerings:
Many of you were interested in participating in Cherry Haisten’s recent Welcoming Prayer Refresher/Enrichment: The Wisdom of Your Body, but could not make the presentations as scheduled. Please feel welcome to view the recordings here.
I love how Vietnamese Buddhist monk and Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh links the body to Mother Earth in his Ten Love Letters to the Earth. An excerpt here:
Dear Mother, wherever there is soil, water, rock or air, you are there, nourishing me and giving me life. You are present in every cell of my body. My physical body is your physical body, and just as the sun and stars are present in you, they are also present in me. You are not outside of me and I am not outside of you. You are more than just my environment. You are nothing less than myself.
I promise to keep the awareness alive that you are always in me, and I am always in you. I promise to be aware that your health and well-being is my own health and well-being. I know I need to keep this awareness alive in me for us both to be peaceful, happy, healthy, and strong.
Sometimes I forget. Lost in the confusions and worries of daily life, I forget that my body is your body, and sometimes even forget that I have a body at all. Unaware of the presence of my body and the beautiful planet around me and within me, I’m unable to cherish and celebrate the precious gift of life you have given me.
Thich Nhat Hanh, Ten Love Letters to the Earth.