It has been a long time since I have written here! While I don’t think I can promise that posts will be quite as regular as they used to be, I have finished the major projects that have taken up the last 6-9 months. If you are interested in reading them, then they will be available for purchase later this year.
With that said, let’s get to Loving Kindness, I have talked about that practice before here, but I recently came across another article that states this practice well. Do you want to know what I love about Loving Kindness meditations? They are a beautiful bridge between contemplative and active practices. I talk a lot on this website about contemplative practices. That is the case principally because we are all so caught up in the busy, busy, busy-ness of our ever-spinning world. In my opinion, we need more reminders to slow down and be still than to be active. Yet, we can’t just stay in the stillness. That stillness — once it takes root down deep at our core — needs to be brought back into the world, which so desperately needs it.
If you have built a practice of centering prayer or meditation to look within, then use Loving Kindness meditation to re-focus your gaze on the rest of the world. Perhaps, that can even be our (belated) Lenten practice. Will you join me?
Wonderful! Readings years ago altered the way I try to perceive people. Two interesting bedfellows—William Faulkner and Norman Vincent Peale—helped me develop a loving, positive perception of folks, even people I didn’t much care for. I later made the effort academically palatable through other writers, but, Dann, your way of presenting lovingkindness is a gift to your readers. Thank you, for this and all your work to make spiritual practices accessible.
Madoc