Universal Loving Kindness & Integral Assessment

TeressaByrdUnit6BlogDiscussionInitialResponse

#3A: One of the hardest things for me to do is to wish no suffering, health, happiness and wholeness for people who have absolutely no remorse for hurting me or the ones, such as my husband, who is closest to me. On the other hand, as I write this, I also felt ashamed of myself for thinking such of a thing. I mean, how many times have I hurt Jesus, my Lord and Savior with all of my intentional sins, but yet He still loves me. He still wants the very best for me. So, I should follow His example, Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing,” (New International Version, 2011, Luke 23:33-35).

I will forgive the people who have wronged me and the ones closest to me, so that I, too, will have freedom from suffering, health happiness and wholeness.

#3B: The area, from my interpretation, that I need to focus on right now is the Interpersonal aspect of my life. I have really been focusing on this a lot, though for about six months. Most of the things I am waiting on is dependent on other people receiving my apologies for doing any wrong to them, and then their accepting me back. They say they would not have said the harsh things they said if they did not love me, that I took their harsh words as an attack. But I just wonder how I was supposed to take their threat of taking my kids away from me for anything less than a threat. Their words to me were, “We are just worried about the kids, we could care less what you do, we just want to know the kids are taken care of,” like I was not going to take care of my kids or something. Now, it would have been different if I had abandoned my children (unforgivable in my book), if I was on drugs or gambling or drinking…but I was NOT DOING ANY of those things! When I did leave my children, they were in good hands, and if I could not make sure of that, I would not go anywhere. I was not perfect, but even in choosing jobs, my children were number one.

I believe I have applied everything I know to do from past experience, except for what I am learning to apply integral practices, with the exception of meditation breathing health and wellness to my son, who is taking my move as a total attack on him, when I hardly saw him in the last two years of our lives, anyway.

Anyone that can give any insight or advice, given the information I have provided now and in the past blogs, or if you need more information to help me to decide what path to take would be appreciated. I just need direction right now. I went from being an avid church attendee and server to almost non-existent. I am learning about the Mormon faith, but I cannot progress in it as quickly as I would like, given I have to study for college and for my massage therapy exam again. I have not decided if the Mormon faith is for me or not. I have to be careful about all of this to make sure it lines up with the Word of God before I make my final decision. I feel lost spiritually for lack of service, I feel lost emotionally because of the people that have turned their back on me for moving to Colorado from Alabama.  

New International Version, (2011). Biblegateway.com. Key Word Search: they know not what they do. Retrieved on June 26, 2011 from the web site: http://www.biblegateway.com/keyword/index.php?search=they%20know%20not%20what%20they%20do&version1=NIV&searchtype=all&limit=none&wholewordsonly=no&startnumber=26

A Subtle Mind

     Comparing the Loving-Kindness with the Subtle Mind Exercise, they both require focus, focus on breathing, they both require control of the thoughts and they both last long enough to have an impression on your stress level coming down.
     Contrasting the two exercises, Loving-kindness has a different focus than the Subtle Mind focus. Loving-kindness focuses on a significant other having a hard time with a disease or a problem. You breath in their disease or problem away from them and into the earth, you breath out happiness, peace, healthy and joy back to the significant loved one.
     In Subtle Mind your focus is either on the breath in or the breath out, or some other focal point. Then, controlling the drifting thoughts, when your mind wanders, you witness the thought and bring it back to focus on breathing in or out, whichever you choose.
     In my experience, deeper be far than any others I have experienced. The Subtle Mind relaxed me so much that the speaker startled me when she began talking after the period of quietness during the exercise. I was finally able to actually bring my wandering mind back to focusing on my breath as I breathed out since it seemed more dramatic than my breathing in, and I need all the help I can get from my own body to help to get me in the mode of real meditation and control of my thoughts.

Discussion Blog Unit 4

     The basis of the teachings was on loving-kindness and having a subtle mind and on how to better achieve them. Loving-kindness focuses on diminishing our focus on ourselves, opening our hearts to others, making way for further personal development. Subtle mind has three levels of witness, calm abiding and human consciousness.

      I disagreed with some of what Docher said. The more I give the more people take without giving back, it seems...until I am just empty from giving of myself to others. I have practiced focusing on others for a very long time now. Why? Because that was one way I dealt with depression. If I wanted to stay in depression, focusing on myself, then I could just sit at home and wait around for bad things to happen and grope and moan about the bad things happening in my life, but no, I did not want that for myself. God revealed this to me, I know HE did. If I focus on others, they get blessed, but I receive an even greater blessing by blessing them!! That is what helped me to overcome depression. I was determined not to live in a depressed state.
       The loving-kindness exercise was so relaxing, I almost went to sleep. The second exercise where we breathed in the suffering of another person was very freeing. Helping someone else, by breathing in their suffering, even doing that for an enemy, and to breath out happiness, joy and wholeness to them. That just felt great to do. I also thought of my son, all the way back in Enterprise, and his loneliness, and secret suffering he has went through with the life and death of his daddy.
I feel slow to react, like my life and mind are too busy to stop long enough. But, as Dacher explains in the subtle mind portion, breath and breathing will help. This exercise relaxed me so much, I had to lie down and rest for a while.
       The concept of a "mental workout" is to train the mind to begin thinking correctly and healthfully so that our mind can probe properly.

Unit 3 Blog Session: Self-Inventory

1.       A. I rate my physical wellbeing as an 8. I cannot seem to shake having problems with my sinuses since I moved to Colorado. The other is my blood pressure. I am diagnosed with high blood pressure. It started at the end of my pregnancy with my last child, 8 years ago. Also, I am obese and want to lose weight. I need to add more physical activity to my routine.

B. I rate my spiritual well-being as a 10. I am behaving myself, finally after some hard trials in the past several months. But I never lost sight of the love God has for me. He just wants to have a healthy relationship with me, and for me to obey Him.

C. I rate my psychological wellbeing as a 5 or 6 or even less. Right now, my family is not happy because I moved to Colorado. They think I left because of sin in my life. My answer is YES, it was, but I left so I could be MORE spiritual, not LESS spiritual, if that makes any sense at all. Some personal issues made it so it was hard to even focus on God during the worship service at church. I was tired of that. I wanted to give God my ALL, not take it away. My family still thinks I should ‘suck up’ my problems and go on about my way, happy or not….I am wrong. Plus, my son has abandoned our relationship and I want it back so desperately. He feels betrayed. He feels like I kicked him out of my house. In the heat of the moment I may have told him to leave, after one of his fits, not getting his way, and I told him if he did not want to obey me or help around the house, then he did not need to live there.

2. Goals:

A. Physically: Add more physical activity.

B. Spiritually: Find a church, find a place to serve God, and have a social network of believers that will encourage me in the way I should go.

C. Mentally: To give my family the space they need, but let them know I have not left them. Or to be open to have a relationship with them, even though they have been so unreasonable in their judgment of me.

3. Plan:

A. Use more mind/body techniques to warrant sickness away and welcome health. Ride a bike, go hiking and camping.

B. Begin visiting more churches, investigate their backgrounds and how they serve others.

C. I have no clue what to do more than I have already done. I have given them space and opportunity to communicate, to no avail.

4. The Relaxation Exercise: After being interrupted two times while doing this, I still found the relaxation exercise relaxing. The reason I would be frustrated would be trying to set aside time to actually do the exercises. Another reason would be not being able to focus on what the guide is trying to help me focus on because of my busy mind. I would like to gain greater control over this aspect of learning mind/body techniques.