Cherishing, protecting, maturing love

I am writing on the move again. I am sitting in Waverley station waiting for a train down to Newcastle. I am giving a talk there tonight. The title I landed on, when I was arranging it, is The Transformative Power of Positive Emotion. Yesterday, speaking to one of the Order Members from Newcastle he commented that he was delighted to hear that was the topic. As he said, it feels very needed at the moment. How true is that! The world has been dragged into an insane and illegal war, causing death and destruction in some parts of the world and rising prices in others. Rising prices might not sound like much when put against war, death and destruction but, for anyone living on the edge of their economic possibilities, it can be devastating. Parents are having to choose between food and fuel to heat the house or feed their children. Climate change is causing unprecedented severe weather crises in various parts of the world. Even here in a more sheltered part of the globe the weather is causing ecological problems to our environment.

Last night, at mandala night, I gave a talk on The Golden Net - the second gift from Bhante’s poem The Four Gifts. This is connected with the second talk from his series on Buddhism for Today and Tomorrow: A Vision of Human Existence. I talked of the interconnectedness of all beings and that we are always living in a network of mutual influence—whether we notice it or not. I made the point that we are each a jewel in that net—reflecting others, and being reflected by them. And the more awareness, kindness, and truthfulness we bring into our lives, the more that net begins to shine. Sadly the converse is also true. We are all affected by the actions of the powerful and sometimes it seems impossible to know how to respond creatively in the face of such horror.

Which brings me to tonight’s talk. I am constantly grateful that I found the Dharma when I did - indeed the fact that I found the Dharma at all seems nothing less than miraculous when I think of where I came from and the life I was leading when I first stumbled into the Glasgow Buddhist Centre. But, fortunately I did and at the heart of Buddhism, I discovered the practice of Metta Bhavana and the other Brahma Viharas: the possibility to respond without hate when faced with hate. To respond with kindness and compassion in the face of cruelty. To work with my natural anger, even rage, that surfaced when faced with needless devastation. 

Metta is the basic positive emotion in Buddhism. It is not an emotion in the sense of a feeling, it is more an orientation and direction of life. In Living with Kindness, Bhante says:

“the love which is the positive form of the first precept is no mere flabby sentiment but the vigorous expression of an imaginative identification with other living beings. … If it is love at all, it is a cherishing, protecting, maturing love which has the same kind of effect on the spiritual being of others as the light and heat of the sun have on their physical being.”  

So Metta has an ethical aspect to it. It is how we live our lives in a strange and unsettling world. “Cherishing, protecting, maturing love” asks us to translate compassion into tangible support—advocacy, healing, allyship—especially meaningful in spaces where people may feel vulnerable. Like the sun fostering life, this love creates a safe, nourishing container where people can feel truly seen and supported—a cornerstone for any healing or transformation of self or of world.

This is what I will be talking about tonight and it is the truth that I try to live my life by. Of course, I don’t always manage this but I believe it to be worth pursuing. I believe that the more awareness, metta, kindness, and truthfulness we bring into our lives, the more the golden net begins to shine. And that will bring sunshine into the darkness.

For now, as always,

May all beings be well, may all beings find true happiness and its causes and may all beings be free from suffering.

Where the Bodhichitta has not yet arisen

May it arise

Where it has arisen

May it flourish

Where it flourishes

May it never die