227. Awareness Through Compassion

If I’m unable to see the reality of my own experience, then I’m less able to act from compassion. I need to be open to the totality of the world around me and to all of the thoughts, feelings, and perceptions arising inside me to even have a chance of seeing clearly.

For my awareness to expand, I need to pay attention to everything that exists. I need to question my understanding of it and of myself, and allow for the possibility that there is more than I’ve already seen. As my awareness grows, my sensitivity to myself and the world around me improves. I notice changes in myself and my environment more easily, and my intuitions tend to guide me towards more compassionate actions.

226. The Emptiness That Is You

There are many subtle ways of binding yourself. You might have a secret desire so powerful that you feel you must fulfill it or not live at all. You might have an aversion to a certain kind of experience that arises regularly and operates quietly throughout your life. You might have a belief buried so deep inside you that it feels like a fundamental part of your being. All of these attachments prevent you from being free, from seeing clearly, and from living joyfully.

225. To Become Better

We generally try to follow the rules because we value the order, predictability, and safety they provide. We also know that a significant deviation from the rules could result in consequences that would make our situation worse.

But strict rule-following can also be harmful. By emphasizing conformity to rules above all else, we tend to become more rigid and mechanical in our actions. We learn to see the path delineated by the rules as the only one available to us, thus limiting our expression and creativity.

224. Language Is Political

If a text appears even slightly political, we approach it with certain expectations. We expect it to take a side, to strongly support one position and argue forcefully against the alternative. We see it as a combatant in a battle with clearly-defined boundaries articulated through centuries of political discourse.

In this discourse, there are always two sides, the good and the bad. The conflict between the two sides is constrained to this binary. Always the argument is for the good side, whatever that might happen to be. Every verbal and factual resource is mustered to tear down the bad side and prop up the good one. The intention is to defeat the bad side by showing it leads to nothing less than moral collapse and ruin, while demonstrating the good side is, in fact, right and good. We’re deeply familiar with this, so we approach such texts with our guard fully raised.

223. Fifty-One Words

He wants to write but he cannot find the words. He has already written three sentences, exactly fifty-one words in total. He knows this because he has counted them twice. Fifty-one words and nothing more. The fifty-second word is not forthcoming.

Whatever spring of imagination supplied his fifty-one words seems to have gone dry. He cannot help but feel despair at this realization. How can he write anything if there are no words available to him? He is trying to build a path to some unknown place but he has already run out of bricks.

222. Dominant Moods

A bad mood can be so strong that it dominates you. It changes the way you see the world by colouring it in a darker light. What was once fun and exciting can quickly transform into nothing more than a frustrating annoyance.

By changing your perspective, your mood also changes you. It shapes your behaviour, it modifies your speech, it alters the way you look. It can do these things because the way you are is less a response to the world around you than it is a response to your own self. This can be helpful, because it means you can solve challenging problems by approaching them with determination and optimism. But it can also be detrimental, like when you become stuck in a profound sorrow and you lose the ability to do anything at all.

221. Compassion Is Self-Compassion

Compassion directed towards another person is also self-compassion. When I treat others with compassion, I also make the world better for myself. By helping others meet their needs and become more aware, they are freed from unnecessary pain and suffering, and they gain an opportunity to become more compassionate.

A more compassionate world is one that is more empathetic, more cooperative, and more loving. I benefit greatly from all of these things, both directly and indirectly. I benefit directly through the ways I’m better treated by the people around me, and indirectly through the more compassionate choices they make in their own lives and in their treatment of others.

220. An Endless Struggle

Making art means struggling with the problem of expression. There’s something you see and you need to share it with others. But you can’t communicate it directly, for you know your words will not be able to reach the thing you see. Your only hope is to somehow show it to others. To do this, you’ll have to create something new.

But creating is not straightforward, and the thing you make is not always capable of doing what you hoped. Your new creation might not possess the power it needs to be effective. This means you have to try again and again. Your efforts amount to a practice that gradually makes you more capable of expression. But it is experienced as a daunting struggle of regular failure and self-doubt.

219. Community Benefits

To be in community with others means understanding you are part of a greater whole. It means knowing other people and being known by them. It means developing lasting relationships that are both caring and trusting. It means cooperating on common goals and sharing the burden of work. It means giving and taking both emotional and material support. It means having people you can rely on when things go wrong.