Preparedness to change

When we are looking for the reasons why we are here and what we have to do why, we should try to get an open mind and to look at all sorts of things, wondering what others think and why.

Today many of us are not pleased with what is going on in the world and would look to see some change. But before we can see some change we ourselves do have to be willing to change as well.

Matthieu Ricard in Tibet (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Matthieu Ricard, scientist turned Buddhist monk and a best selling author, translator, and photographer, who has lived and studied in the Himalayas for more than 35 years. says:

if we want to change, obviously we need to need to first act on the emotions, and this will help change our moods, which will eventually stabilize as a modified temperament. In other words, we must start by working with the instantaneous events that take place in our minds. As we say, if we take care of the minutes, the hours will take care of themselves.

To be able to act on the emotions first of all we do need to recognise these emotions and secondly should make ourselves able to distance from them to examine them properly. Mostly we are inner-bound with our own actions and reactions, guided by our way of thinking and our traditions. How we are brought up as a child is going to be the basic foundation for our analysing and feeling.

So one of the key points has to do with the way the chaining of thoughts occurs, the way one thought leads to another.

That what happened in the past, the things we encountered in previous days and years, the things we heard from our parents and beloved ones, will give us ideas of what had happened, what decisions where taken, what the consequences where.

Ricard says:

‘You can look at your experience like a fire that burns. If you are aware of anger you are not angry you are aware. Being aware of anxiety is not being anxious it is being aware.’ By being aware of these emotions you are no longer adding fuel to their fire and they will burn down.

Would it therefore not be bad to look in the past with other eyes? When we have found the Word of God and got into the readings of the Bible, would this not give an other insight? When we then would look back we should have, with our ‘other eyes’ an other viewpoint. It would not be so much a ‘staring back’ but better a ‘‘reviewing back’  and a  ‘retraining back’ .

When we instead of staring are overlooking everything ‘from outside’, with a neuter attitude, we will be able to take distance in person from the facts and the emotions. Sometimes it is better to put away the emotions to come to a better view and better understanding. Our personal feelings often blind us. By taking personal distance we would be able to let its apparent solidity melt away and let personal bounded thought vanish without giving birth to a chain of other personal thoughts.

The point is not to try to block the arising of thoughts – this is not possible anyway – but not to let them invade our mind. We need to do this again and again because we are not used to dealing with thoughts in that way. We are like a sheet of paper that has been rolled for a long time. If we try to flatten it down on the table, it will roll again the moment we lift our hands. This is where the training takes place.

says Matthieu Ricard who thinks we do need to practice Buddhism, but overlooks that in Christianity we should have the same reflection as our Master Teacher Jeshua (Jesus Christ) who looked to this world from the viewpoint of his Father, the Creator God. We also should always wonder “What Would Jesus Do” (WWJD) and “How Would Jesus React” (HWJR). How would Jesus meet with others, talk to sinners, help those in need?

What Ricard says abnout Buddhism is also true for us, who call ourselves Christian:

“We are talking about how to help society. If we aspire to contribute something to our society – to achieve a new vision of things – we need to begin with ourselves. We need to decide to transform ourselves, and that can come only through training, not through fleeting ideas.

To fulfil our life goal we do have the infallible Word of God, which can give us insight and guidance for future days. To benefit from it we only should have to open our eyes and put away our previous predisposed ideas of our own self in this world. All bias we should abandon and liberate our mind by letting the Word of God shape us in all integrity. Merging the ideas of several minds, looking into the Word of God and than using our own emotional Intelligence we can let the Holy Spirit work in us by allowing time for Him to be in us, bringing contemplative practices into our own world, the workplace and therefore into the world. To be able to become transformed by the Bible, we should be willing to take time to concentrate on the Word of God and to let it come into us personally.

Psalm 119:105 “Your Word is a Lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” (Photo credit: UnlockingTheBible)

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Please read:

1. Wisdom from Matthieu Ricard > original Wisdom from Matthieu Ricard
2. and: “Destructive Emotions: A Scientific Dialogue with the Dalai Lama“, Daniel Goleman
3. A living change
4. Time for global change
5. Only I can change my life
6. We all are changed into the same image from glory to glory
7. Character transformed by the influence of our fellowships

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Emotions Q-sort (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

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