You and I are in training to be free. Weâre in training to be so present, so spacious, so embracing, weâre in training to not look away, deny or close our hearts when we canât bear something. The statement, âI canât bear it,â is what burns you out in social action. When youâre in the presence of suffering and contracting, itâs the contraction that starves you to death.
When you close your heart down to protect yourself from suffering, you also close yourself off from being fed by that same life situation.
If you can stay open to both the suffering and the joys and the stuff of life, all of it, then itâs like a living spirit. It just connects to your living spirit and thereâs a tremendous feeding going on.
Once you see all this, what else is there to do but keep working on becoming conscious? Youâd be a fool not to. Youâre only going to perpetuate your misery and suffering and everybody elseâs if you donât.
The other thing is to do it joyfully! When you meet somebody thatâs suffering, what do you have to offer them? You could offer them your empathy. Thatâs a good thing to offer because they feel somebody else is listening to them. The other thing you can offer them is your joy, your presence, and your ânot getting caught in it all.â
Having that empathy for another means your heart is breaking, because you understand the intensity of their experience, and at the same moment, you are absolutely, equanimously, present. You are not clinging to anything, just watching the phenomena of the universe change.
- Ram Dass
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