The Greatest Wealth of All is Generosity

1 Comment | Posted on May 5, 2012 by Lou
Guest blogger, Pamela Ayo Yetunde, shares with us a reflection on generosity. It’s based on her recent book, Vigil: Spiritual Reflections on Your Money and Sanity.

I love paradox. From Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount to the Heart Sutra in Zen Buddhism to The Tao te Ching of Taoism, spiritual teachers throughout the world and throughout the generations have used paradox to help spiritual seekers become still, contemplate, expand their minds, arrive at a new sense of self, embrace others more fully and hence, become more generous. So how can we cultivate generosity in an age of economic recession, slow recovery and uncertainty? Dwell courageously in paradox.

Dwelling courageously in paradox is no easy thing for Americans. We are a nation and a people on the go and in need of certainty. We get rewarded for speed and multi-tasking and get questioned and judged for not producing at high levels. To “not know” brings about ridicule and shame. To dwell courageously in paradox requires humility and faith; humility because we are often tricked into thinking we know more than we do, and faith because we know we don’t know everything, but can avail ourselves of something greater than ourselves. As we become humble, if we’re paying attention, we can begin to sense a lessening of our grasping tendencies. As faith grows, and we’re paying attention, we can experience a new willingness to rely on things greater than ourselves. Cultivating generosity is about letting go of the small stuff to give in to greatness.

As the small gives way to the great, as our perceptions change through humility and faith, dwelling courageously in paradox is aided by patience. Patience, in the context of cultivating generosity, is about refraining from chasing after particular outcomes. Seems un-American? It is in a way. To refrain from chasing after particular outcomes means you position yourself for accepting whatever happens and whatever is, as it is. You make a choice, through patience, not to seek rewards for making things happen. You let go of the need to be congratulated for a “job” well done. Patience creates emotional spaciousness, equanimity and an increased ability to see other people’s needs with strength. So now we see how paradoxes emerge. What is considered weak by some (non-forcefulness) is actually strength. It is this strength that gives us courage to be generous, especially in hard economic times. But what if we dwell more deeply in paradox to discover whether these hard economic times of grasping are actually soft economic times of generosity?

Before I became a chaplain and pastoral counselor, I worked as a financial advisor helping people manage their money, invest, insure and plan for retirement. During those years, in the late 1990s, I didn’t hear much talk about creating political and economic systems that support people who fall on hard times. I heard a lot of, “If I can become rich so can you!” Economic prosperity can lead to spiritual poverty if we forget to dwell in paradox. So let’s remember this as we head toward a hotly contested U.S. presidential election that will certainly center around economics – the greatest wealth is not what you accumulate but what you give away with gladness.

Pamela Ayo Yetunde, M.A. is a pastoral counselor and the author of Vigil: Spiritual Reflections on Your Money and Sanity (Marabella Books, 2012). Visit www.boundlesshearts.wordpress.com for more information.

© 2012, emerging by Lou Kavar, Ph.D.. All rights reserved.

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Starting Over Again

2 Comments | Posted on April 27, 2012 by Lou

It’s happened before. I’m sure it will happen again. Each time, I learn something new about myself. While I find it difficult to say that the new insight is sufficient to make it a good experience, I can’t really say it’s been a bad one. It’s just part of the process.

A few months ago, life’s events pulled me away from my regular spiritual practice. To be more honest, it may be better to say that I allowed those events to pull me away from regular spiritual practice. Because of what was going on in my life, meditation and other contemplative activities became very difficult. For example, when I’d go to sit in meditation, I’d experience a number of things I just wanted to avoid. Sometimes it was outright emotional pain. Other times it was more of a sense of anxiety. Still others, silence would take me to a place where I’d just feel blue. It was easier just to avoid it all.

Over this period, I continued to attend church services and sit in meditation with others. There were a few times I cried quietly but mostly, in these group settings, I was numb. I went through the external motions of being part of the group.

I was aware that my lack of regularity in spiritual practice led to other imbalances in my life. Some were physical: I didn’t sleep as well at night. Despite the increasingly warmer temperatures, arthritis pain and stiffness were more noticeable. As I became less centered, my diet also became more unhealthy. I was also less patient with people and generally more irritable. Imbalance in one area of my life led to the next. It wasn’t long before I felt as though I was spinning out of control.

In recent weeks, I’ve found myself to be more regular in prayer and meditation. Starting over again was more difficult than I expected. For several days, when I’d begin a meditation sitting, it felt empty. Keeping silent for five or ten minutes seemed like an hour. But, after some time, I began to relax into the silence. As I found myself to be more rooted in the silence, I became aware of how other aspects of my life were returning to balance. My thinking was more clear and work became easier. I wanted more physical exercise. Overall, I was finding myself more relaxed and patient.

In my book, The Integrated Self, I discuss how each aspect or dimension of our lives is interconnected with the others. While I know that is true, the experience of the growing disconnection that was happening for me helped to make clear how important balance in one dimension in life can be for all the other areas. As I returned to contemplative practice, the other dimensions of my life came back to wholeness.

I noted that the disintegration began as some other things in my life were pulling me in a different direction. I have no control over those other things. There’s much about our lives we have very little control over. These other concerns in my life have been a source of pain and tension. In a way, I gave into them and let them take control. In doing so, I was no longer grounded and centered. However, perhaps if I had been more constant in my contemplative practice, had I maintained my inner grounding, then the situations over which I have no control would not have led to the imbalance I experienced. In other words, by not continuing to engage in contemplative practices that would have helped me sort out the mix of emotional turmoil I experienced, I probably made things more difficult on myself.

What’s the lesson to be learned? It’s a familiar one for many people: spiritual practice keeps us grounded and centered when other aspects of life become difficult for us. That grounding helps to provide balance for every other dimension in life (our bodies, emotions, relationships, and mental abilities) even when there is serious turmoil in life. Regular spiritual practice helps to keep us whole and healthy.

It’s not that I don’t know this important lesson about the importance of spiritual practice in my life. I’m probably like most people: there are times when knowing something doesn’t mean that we always do it. But perhaps this recent experience will help me to do better next time when parts of life grow out of control.

© 2012, emerging by Lou Kavar, Ph.D.. All rights reserved.

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Love Dogs

Leave a comment | Posted on April 19, 2012 by Lou

Love Dogs
A Poem by Rumi, translated by Coleman Barks

One night a man was crying Allah! Allah!
His lips grew sweet with praising,
until a cynic said, “So!
I’ve heard you calling out, but have you ever
gotten any response?”
The man had no answer to that.
He quit praying and fell into a confused sleep.
He dreamed he saw Khidr, the guide of souls,
in a thick, green foliage.
“Why did you stop praising?” “Because
I’ve never heard anything back.”
“This longing you express
is the return message.”
The grief you cry out from
draws you toward union.
Your pure sadness
that wants help
is the secret cup.
Listen to the moan of a dog for its master.
That whining is the connection.
There are love dogs
no one knows the names of.
Give your life
to be one of them.

Eight hundred years ago, Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī, known today simply as Rumi, stepped beyond the limits of his own Persian culture and Islamic religion to articulate in poetry a profound understanding of the experience of the Divine within human life. Rumi and his followers sought out connections between the Divine and human experience in ordinary events: watching animals, sharing in frivolity in taverns, making music, and dancing.

Among Rumi’s timeless insights is an understanding of desire as the primary characteristic of spirituality. For Rumi, desire is not just the aspiration toward union with the Divine. Instead, desire is both the human aspiration and the Divine inspiration of connection, union, and communion.

I find the language of desire to be both attractive as well as uncomfortable. Desire conveys to me a sense of something mysterious and primordial – a deep longing in my gut that isn’t easily satisfied. At the same time, my Christian up-bringing has taught me that desire is related to selfishness and somehow leads to sin. My discomfort with the concept of desire is only made more complex from my study of Buddhism which views desire and attachment as the root of suffering.

Rather than falling prey to confusion by the use of the word desire, I’ve thought about my own experience in meditation. When I sit in silence, my awareness of things around me fades away and my attention turns toward an inner reality. Resting in this inner reality, I experience a complex set of feelings and sensations. It’s as though something within me grows larger and begins to fill me up. As I become more aware of something filling me from the inside, I turn myself over to it and allow it to become my reality. Sometimes there are physical sensations that accompany the experience. I find myself not simply at peace but beyond peace in a state where I feel as though I’m both floating and securely tethered. Whether the experience lasts a few moments or for thirty minutes, I simply want more. I want it to last longer, to go deeper, and to grow larger. Yet, I don’t find it disconcerting to return to my ordinary sense of time and place because something of the experience remains with me.

In the experience, I find myself at union with something more than myself. There is a deep communion and sharing of myself with the Divine Other. In that encounter, I remain myself while I find myself becoming smaller as the Divine Other encompasses me.

Out of this experience, I understand what Rumi means that the desire for union with Allah is itself the response from Allah of the Divine presence. Words to describe the experience reduce the encounter to something less than it is. Yet, Rumi’s use of the word desire does encapsulate something of it. It’s not a selfish kind of desire aimed at my own pleasure nor the kind of desire that absorbs one into some unnecessary attachment. Instead, it is the pure desire that comes with love for another, that simply draws a person to open self fully and without condition.

Perhaps the words of Rumi’s poetry can help capture something of this experience. And so, I close by encouraging you to listen to this recitation of Love Dogs by Rumi scholar Coleman Barks.

© 2012, emerging by Lou Kavar, Ph.D.. All rights reserved.

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