We had the honor of six Tibetan Buddhist monks chanting for us at church last Sunday. Only one of them spoke English, and he spoke for less than two minutes. I was listening to him and now I don’t remember what he was saying. Then, all of the sudden, it seemed as though he woke me up.
He said that our dedication would make the difference. We could pray for one – ourselves or another, or we could pray for all.
If I am praying for patience or peace or prosperity for myself, why would I not pray for patience or peace or prosperity for everyone?
If I am praying for healing or happiness or humor for another, why would I not pray for healing or happiness or humor for all?
I’m not sure why this concept felt so new to me. I have written many affirmative prayers and have often included a Buddhist phrase, “may all beings . . .”
For some reason, the way he said it called me to be present with holding a desire for all, instead of holding a desire for just me or just my friend. The beauty of this: it requires no more of me to dedicate my prayers for all.
So, I wrote a new prayer. For All of us.
Why pray for only me, when I can pray for All of us? When my heart
goes out to a friend in pain, why not send my heart out to All who are
in pain?
For the Love of All
May All of us hold our humanity lightly
and embody our Divinity powerfully.
May All of us express our own unique gifts,
in ways that only we can.
May All of us lose track of time,
Living the present moment, fully and completely.
May All of us know ourselves as Love.
May All of us know ourselves as Love.
(Excerpted from my forthcoming book, “Strong from Within.”)
I would love your thoughts and responses. Post comments and insights below . . .
Dawn, I feel your heart. Thank you for your beautiful perspective of feeling so passionately about compassion for all living things! And for your acknowledgment of my thoughts.
Thank you for such profound and beautiful, expressive thoughts. They really speak to me, feeling that the thing I feel most passionate about is compassion for all living things!
Stephanie, even though I had heard (and written) it before, I hadn’t known it or taken it in. Now, I seem to have woken up to it! Yes, life-changing!!! How great is that?!?
GG,
Thank you so much for your strong acknowledgement.:) You and me both – I cannot wait for Strong from Within! And, you know what, I’m learning to live it and share it. YAY indeed!
Puff… Que desastre. Y ni se habrán enterado que han perdido muchos encargos. Porque aquà todos tenÃamos proyectos de libros.¡Guardádme un ejemplar de “La clave es pública” |
I’m very happy with the Webmaster Tools but can’t find a contact person – our crawl (and importantly, site-response-time) stats have been frozen since mid-December. I’m pretty sure you’re still crawling but I don’t seem to have an update…
In all of the conversations I’ve had and heard about prayer, I’ve never heard this. Thank you so much for passing this on! Such a simple shift, yet life changing!
I can NOT wait for your next book Strong from Within!!!! I’m tickled and delighted to receive the excerpts you share! Thank you for gifting me such incredible prayers to use in my daily personal life and my work with my clients. Your words are profound and move all who hear them. Yaay!!!! Strong from Within!!!