The Courage to Feel: Buddhist Practices for Opening to Others by Rob Preece

Author:Rob Preece
Language: eng
Format: azw3, pdf
Publisher: Snow Lion
Published: 2009-11-25T00:00:00+00:00

As adults, we need to come to the place where we recognize that every person is both positive and negative. The splitting of the good and bad mother leads us to split ourselves, too. We may feel that we are good and acceptable because we split off and bury what may feel bad and unacceptable.

When I consider my own mother, I can see that she was immensely kind to me in caring for me on a material level even though she was emotionally anxious and overconcerned because of her own insecurities. Finding a more balanced picture of my mother required letting go of a relatively immature emotional perspective that was still angry at her for being anxious and needy. It required that I begin to move through the anger to recognize that I could be more adult and responsible and see that she had her problems and actually did the best she could. This enabled me to see that she also had many good qualities that were very nurturing and caring. As I have learned to accept the good and bad in my own mother, this is reflected in how I see others, as well as myself.

From my own experience, the value of these meditations on the mother rests not just on reflecting upon her kindness but also upon her fallibility and human struggle. It was particularly by understanding the cause of my own mother's difficulties that I was able to hold a more compassionate feeling towards her. Through reflecting on what it is like to be a mother and the nature of motherhood, I felt I gradually gained a more balanced perspective. In my own meditations I also needed to include my frustrations, disappointments, irritations, and outrage. I needed to let them be present and gradually let them go, without judging those feelings as wrong or bad. Only by relating to them in a more open and accepting way did I allow them to pass through and reach a quieter, resolved state.

In practice, what this process requires is that we begin our meditation by visualizing our own mother sitting before us, and spend time looking at all the feelings she brings up. We need to let them arise and to witness their nature without pushing them away or becoming caught in them and stirring them up. It may be useful to simply name them or find a phrase or image for them. Holding a place that is free of blame and fundamentally open and compassionate, we allow the feelings to arise and pass. We also need to look at what it is in our mother that evokes these feelings-again, without blame, but really with a greater objectivity and impartiality.

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