Christmas meditation
On a Christmas day when my extended family members had no plans that included me, and the weather (icy rain) has kept me alone at home when I might otherwise have joined friends at the Como Conservatory and/or a Newtonfast party:
In honor of the spirit of Christmas, I want to understand my family in the most generous possible light.
Because I feel somewhat discounted and forgotten among the extended family in which I grew up, I want to understand them with all the love and compassion I would wish for myself in their place. I look to understand them with the same compassion I pray for my own part, in light of my human limitations.
I ask, how would I wish to be understood, if I had a husband and children and possibly grandchildren, and lived daily with all the demands of the people closest to me? What would I want others to understand if the demands of my life left me with little extra time or energy or resources for others, however much I might care about them?
I want to bring to my rejected feelings all the awareness, understanding, compassion and acceptance they need, in order that I may make peace with myself, and so better understand the people in my life. Understanding my own limitations gives me the basis for understanding the limitations of others.
If I embrace my feelings of resentment so as to comfort them with all due compassion, then I am at peace, and being at peace, it is easy to wish my estranged relations all the peace and happiness and joy the season can bring them.
And if I am happy with my own company, that is certainly a bonus.
.
.
In honor of the spirit of Christmas, I want to understand my family in the most generous possible light.
Because I feel somewhat discounted and forgotten among the extended family in which I grew up, I want to understand them with all the love and compassion I would wish for myself in their place. I look to understand them with the same compassion I pray for my own part, in light of my human limitations.
I ask, how would I wish to be understood, if I had a husband and children and possibly grandchildren, and lived daily with all the demands of the people closest to me? What would I want others to understand if the demands of my life left me with little extra time or energy or resources for others, however much I might care about them?
I want to bring to my rejected feelings all the awareness, understanding, compassion and acceptance they need, in order that I may make peace with myself, and so better understand the people in my life. Understanding my own limitations gives me the basis for understanding the limitations of others.
If I embrace my feelings of resentment so as to comfort them with all due compassion, then I am at peace, and being at peace, it is easy to wish my estranged relations all the peace and happiness and joy the season can bring them.
And if I am happy with my own company, that is certainly a bonus.
.
.