Allowing our innate kindness to shine

The theme we are exploring in A Year of Meditation for August is kindness, which is another habit of happy people. Being kind makes us feel happy. 

The perennial philosophy at the core of all major religious traditions around the world is beautifully summarised by Rupert Spira as:

The nature of my being is peace and happiness

And I share my being with everyone and everything.

Love is the recognition of our shared being with others and the source of the inherent kindness of our aware being. So when we are kind we are acting in accordance with the nature of our being, we are in touch with an inherent quality of our aware being, and this makes us feel happy.

This is why at Beachcomber Meditation we don’t talking about cultivating kindness, but rather we talk about creating the conditions for our innate kindness to shine. Our innate kindness is like the sun, always shining. However, much of the conditioning we have experienced in our life blocks our innate kindness, just as clouds block the light from the sun reaching us here on the Earth.

In order to allow the innate kindness of our aware being to shine, this month we will be exploring some of the clouds. We will be drawing on the Buddhist metta bhavana practice where we set up flows of kindness and then notice what happens.

We set up the flows of kindness by bringing to mind particular classes or groups of people and silently saying kindness phrases for them. Then we notice where we open up to the flow of kindness and where we close down. 

When we open up we focus on any felt sense of kindness as this dissolves some of the clouds and grows our confidence in the innate kindness of aware being and the confidence to allow it to shine freely. 

When we close down we become curious about what thoughts, emotions and sensation we experience. We allow these thoughts, emotions and sensations freedom to unfold themselves, trusting that this creates the causes and conditions for insight into the blocks.

These insights are like the wind, gradually blowing the clouds away, to reveal the shining sun. But we allow this to happen in its own time and in its own way, without any need to analyse, interfere or get involved with the thoughts, emotions and sensations.

You are welcome to join us in our exploration of our innate kindness during August.