Be Kind To Every Living Thing

I remember in my Reiki 1 class when we were discussing the Precepts and, as I looked at this one, I thought "Of course, that means we take care of the environment, be nice to people and animals and treat them with respect, etc. etc." Imagine my surprise when my teacher suggested that, first and foremost, we needed to be kind to ourselves!


I guess it came as a surprise to me because, frankly, I'm not very good at it. I referenced a book in my last blog post called "Radical Acceptance - Embracing Your Life With The Heart Of A Buddha" by Tara Brach and she begins the book with this statement "Believing that something is wrong with us is a deep and tenacious suffering." Yep. That describes me to a T. Both the belief AND the attendant suffering.

But it makes sense, doesn't it? Until we can be gentle with ourselves and treat ourselves with kindness, we cannot be gentle and kind to another living being. Especially around our shortcomings. We all have them. It’s part of being human. When we can have compassion in the face of our own mistakes, we will know what someone else is feeling when they mess up and can treat them with loving kindness instead of derision and disdain. I know for me, that derision and disdain that I often feel towards others is really about me.

That said, I think we have to be careful because kindness, doing for others, doing for this cause and that movement, can also be a cover up for our own feelings of unworthiness.

So what does this mean in terms of our day-to-day lives? Remember the Golden Rule we all learned in grade school – Do unto others as you would have them do unto you? That might be a good place to start. What about animals, pets or otherwise? Plants? Bugs? Personally, I have a difficult time looking the other way when there is a spider dangling from the ceiling in front of my face as I’m working out on my elliptical. But why? What am I afraid of? Well, what if it was poisonous? Hmmm. That’s a tough one, though I don't think there are any where I live...

I think the difficulty is that when we give ourselves permission to kill that spider or fly, or whatever, it’s easier to give ourselves permission to not care about the bird who flies into a window or the bear caught in a horribly painful trap, the homeless animals, the homeless people…and then where does it end?

Does that mean we beat ourselves up if we accidentally step on a bug? No, but it might mean that we stop for a moment the next time we encounter one and consider whether we might be able to shoo it out the door or...just let it be.

What about learning to sit with and breathe through those uncomfortable feelings instead of trying to avoid them or cover them, make up for them, by numbing out with a substance or an activity? When we can do that, we learn that feelings pass. We learn that our feelings are not to be feared and they are not necessarily the truth of who we are. We learn that often, underneath the most uncomfortable feelings, there is something that needs our love and acceptance.

Being kind to all living things. Revering life, all of life, in all its forms. Especially our own.

Namaste,
Janet

I Will Do My Work Honestly

On the surface, the fourth precept seems to be about doing an honest day's work and we can take that to mean several things: Putting our best effort into each and every task, paid or unpaid, and treating those whom we encounter in the course of performing those tasks with integrity and respect. Sound advice to be sure when we consider the benefits to our self-esteem and the resulting healthy relationships that will flow from doing so.

Given that Usui's original intention was that Reiki be a spiritual path, I'd be willing to bet he had something else in mind with this precept.  My guess is that we are being instructed to put some effort each day into working on that spiritual growth by setting aside some time to self treat, meditate on the precepts and what they mean to us, and meditate simply for its own sake, since that was and is a big part of Buddhist practice and we know that Usui was a Tendai Buddhist. 

But where does the "honestly" fit into working on our spiritual path?  Since many of us find it difficult to to squeeze yet another demand into our already crowded days, it might mean that we need to take a look at our need to be so busy.  Are we afraid to face what might surface if we slow down and get quiet?  Anger, perhaps, or worry?  Feeling less-than?  The Chinese pictogram for "busy" also means "heart-killing" - and we can take that literally knowing what we do about the effect of stress on our body, as well as figuratively when we consider the effect of being disconnected from our inner self and not taking time to properly rest and rejuvenate. 

Being overly focused on spiritual growth and development can serve the same purpose, though, by distracting us from what is really going on inside and giving us another way to numb out and/or feel "superior-to".

Incorporating the precepts into our daily lives and using them to guide our thoughts and actions doesn't mean that we beat ourselves up when we fall short - and it's almost inevitable that we will.  It takes courage to honestly face those shadow aspects of ourselves and bring them into the light, where we can hold them tenderly and allow them to heal.  Keeping them hidden only allows them to grow bigger, more menacing and more destructive to ourselves and others.

For anyone wishing to explore this theme even further, I highly recommend reading "Radical Acceptance - Embracing Your Life With The Heart Of A Buddha" by Tara Brach, Ph.D.

Namaste,
Janet