CHERISHING ALL LIVING BEINGS

Hello friends,

Cherishing all living beings. This is a hard pill to swallow, at first. Certain individuals may come to mind at this moment, people who you feel you'd have a difficult time cherishing. Well, in order to cherish all living beings, we need those people in our lives who irritate us. They help us develop patience, tolerance, love and compassion for others.

In the book Eight Steps to Happiness, Gyatso explains how anger and attachments are delusions of the mind. If a friend of ours was suffering from cancer, we would not blame him for his disease. In the same light, we should not blame jealous or self-cherishing people for their disease of the mind.

What is self-cherishing? It's the act of putting your needs before everyone else. It's when we think of ourselves as superior over others and our happiness and freedom is more important than anyone else's, that our wishes and feelings matter more, that our life and experiences are more interesting. (Gyatso) 

Each one of us is guilty of possessing attachments to material things. We've all felt anger and jealously towards others. We are all guilty of self-cherishing. So, this means we're all suffered from several diseases of the mind? Yes. Does this mean that we are all delusional? Yeah, sort-of, according to Buddha's teachings. But this is not our fault. We live in a country that penetrates our minds with the notion that self-worth is the key to happiness. We live in a highly self-driven and competitive society. We cannot blame ourselves. When common mantras in our country are "The one with the most toys wins" and "Keeping up with Jones's"; we're taught to see the world through rose-colored glasses. We are a prideful nation. There is nothing wrong with pride, if you feel pride from helping others. You should not feel pride in yourself if you helped someone for selfish reasons. Our nation's citizens are quick to become "heroes" when the stakes are high, but would our so-called heroes sacrifice their comfort for a homeless man tomorrow? This is the conflict in our thinking and nature. We pick and choose when to cherish others. I'll admit that I'm conflicted with this mentality too, but I can honestly say that I'm doing everything in my power within to alter this way of life. It will not come easy, but it will come, eventually, with much practice.

How can you cherish others when they do not cherish you? They don't have to cherish you. If people treat us with kindness and respect and place us on a pedestal; it only reinforces our delusions and depletes our merit. If someone criticizes you and you are able to look past the delusions in their mind and only see the good qualities in that person, you earn spiritual merit. Gyatso explains how this works. In Buddhist beliefs "our spiritual realizations are our inner wealth because they help us in all situations and are the only possessions we can take with us when we die. Once we learn to value... patience, giving, love, and compassion above external conditions we will come to regard each and every living being as supremely precious, no matter how they treat us. This will make it very easy for us to cherish them."

Thank you. I cherish you for reading my thoughts.

All positive comments, insights and questions are welcome.