This poem was written in 2008 by Adeola Fearon in response to and in honor of WTVI/Charlotte’s Campaign for Love & Forgiveness conversations.
Garden of Forgiveness
in the garden of forgiveness
it takes courage to hear
“I’m sorry”
as much as it does
to plan something
that feeds the soul
the quality of life
inspired
by a moving experience
touched by an angel
sent to elevate your life
to slow down
create a bridge
between heart and mind
to one day share
with your children
wise words
making an impact
joy
optimism
diversity
share your spirit
for a new
tomorrow
how passionate are you
to see things from a new view
to flower
possibilities
It can be hard to tell what heartache those around us are experiencing and what a small kindness, a smile, or a touch can do to help. Sometimes we are the one in pain and tending to our own heart is what’s really needed. And sometimes just bringing to our awareness what others may be feeling can open our hearts and change our behavior.
Reaching out to others is not only kind, it is good for our health. And, according to research, kindness can become contagious. (No Purell needed here!) This month of Valentine’s Day (symbolically, at least) can be a reminder that love, listening, and presence are some of the greatest gifts we can give ourselves and others–from those who are close and important to us to those we pass in the hall at work, on the street, or in a checkout line.
Knowing that loss is inevitable can actually open our hearts to others and awaken us to each moment. So, why not “fall in love” with an ever-widening circle of people, like Bobbie Willis, a contributor to The Sun Magazine’s “Readers Write” section describes so beautifully.
“What saves me from the tedium of another day,” she writes, “is falling hopelessly in love with the people I meet: the curly-haired barista at the coffee shop who hands me my change as if dipping his fingers into holy water; the girl with Down syndrome who talks loudly about vacationing with her grandmother; the elderly couple who grow giant bubble-gum-colored puffs of dahlias at the corner of Twelfth and Chambers; the toddler girl across the street who bleats sweetly, “Mama come see!”; I fall in love with the deep timbre of my brother’s laugh; the way my mother says my name; the way my father calls me sweetheart; the way my sweetheart calls me baby.”
This reflection is from Thom Andrews, director of Kalamazoo’s Season of Forgiveness.
During this past weekend we again marked the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The question it brought to mind for me this year was this: can forgiveness make its way into mainstream civic discourse?
One of the many unsettling dynamics in our political arena is how thin-skinned our politicians make themselves out to be (though they probably aren’t so). Individuals are quick to take great personal offense at the mere implication of a slight, and these individuals are quick to go to the media and speak of their rage. The strategy becomes not so much to rise above the fray as to become the fray that pushes down the other person.
Exceptions to this political game seem few and far between. I wonder, however, if they aren’t so few but simply less reported. One recent exception I discovered is in Malaysia where, in the wake of multiple attacks on churches, Christians and Muslims and “even politicians across the political divide” condemned the attacks. They made statements and took actions so that “an air of repentance and forgiveness prevailed.” The writer called the acts “unprecedented.”
Wisdom and maturity can prevail over shallow political maneuvering. Let’s help make this our future.
Quote for reflection throughout the week
We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. –Martin Luther King, Jr.
From the web
Here is the article describing the situation in Malaysia that I mention above.
This article echoes Dr. King’s call to disarm our enemies with love.
I watched the first program in the three-part PBS series, This Emotional Life last night. It was fascinating to see how “families, friends, and lovers” navigated the terrain of human connection–especially when it was terribly challenging. This kind of information should be taught in school–after all we spend our lives in relationship to others, yet often learn relational skills on the fly.
The series “explores improving our social relationships, learning to cope with depression and anxiety, and becoming more positive, resilient individuals. Each episode weaves together the compelling personal stories of ordinary people and the latest scientific research.” If you missed the first program, I encourage you to catch the next two, which are airing on many public television stations tonight and tomorrow at 9 p.m. (check local listings).
In an article about the series on the Huffington Post, Xavier Amador, a consultant for the series and a clinical psychologist pointed out the importance of emotions that are painful in helping us connect with one another. “When we are sad, people reach out to us and we feel the desire to be held, cared for, loved. Anxiety often has the same effect. And when we come together we can then pursue common causes such as the search for food, creating shelter, defense against predators–our genes survive and are passed on to the next generation.”
We all suffer. We all are imperfect. How best do we relate and support each other knowing this? So far, I’m finding that This Emotional Life is providing some good insights.
In a recent Case Western Reserve release, the university announced that researchers from the Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing and the College of Arts and Sciences at Case Western will begin groundbreaking studies to understand what drives the dying to live long enough to personal and interpersonal issues.
With the research data, they will design interventions to help patients in hospice care and families before and after the person passes.
Before now, end of life research primarily focused on making the patient comfortable by easing suffering or discomfort from the illness.
But, the approach of Barbara Daly and Mary Jo Prince-Paul from the School of Nursing and Julie Exline from Arts and Sciences is to relieve psychological distress by marshaling the patient’s inner strengths and social connections.
These qualities include the resilient feelings of hope, optimism and connectedness that they mustered to make it through difficult and even life-threatening situations before their terminal illnesses. Marshaling these inner resources has been shown to improve the psychological outlook of healthy people, and the researchers want to find out the benefits for those severely ill.
Forgiveness will also be a focus of the study, which is partially funded by the Fetzer Institute. Exline, who has studied forgiving oneself, others and God over the past decade, will survey family members before and after the death of the loved one to see how hospice workers can help them as they undergo the emotional stress of caring for this seriously ill family member and then the challenges of bereavement.
The highest expression of love is creativity.
–Deepak Chopra
Love has inspired countless works of art, from immortal plays such as Romeo and Juliet, to architectural masterpieces such as the Taj Mahal, to classic pop songs, like Queen’s “Love of My Life”.
–Nira Liberman and Oren Shapiro, “Does Falling In Love Make Us More Creative,” Scientific American
According to a recent study, thinking of love can make us more creative. The experiments, conducted by psychologists Jens Förster, Kai Epstude, and Amina Özelsel at the University of Amsterdam, suggest that love induces us to think long term, “triggering global processing”–a sort of psychological distancing or perspective–which promotes creativity. Thinking of sex, however, actually engages analytical–short-term, detail-oriented–thinking.
“One of the most noteworthy implications of these experiments is that love and sex don’t simply influence the way we think about the people we love or desire,” says an article in Scientific American. “Instead, they influence the way we think about everything.”
A friend just rekindled a romantic relationship. She and her (re)new love have kicked the creativity quotient into high gear. They both are sending letters and writing poetry to each other. She is knitting, creating collage, and trying new things. There is an aliveness in creative areas of her life that had long been dormant. It may be anecdotal, but they both agree, their rekindled creativity is due to their rekindled love.
It makes me wonder how much more there is to it than global processing. I wonder if thinking of love does something that can’t be quantified–if it opens our hearts and if, with open hearts, we are more creative.
I wonder, too if the expression of creativity is actually a form of love itself. To me, it encompasses both self love and love of others by giving expression to the creative spirit–that kernel of uniqueness and connection to something larger within each of us.
And for those who think creativity is limited to those who express their talents through the “arts,” in fact, ways of expressing creativity are only limited by creativity itself.
If you haven’t already watched Playing for Change’s wonderful video, Stand By Me, or Matt Harding’s Where the Hell is Matt? videos of him dancing in locations and with people from around the world, check them out. It may just trigger that “global processing” the Dutch researchers refer to.
As we approach the unveiling of the Charter for Compassion on November 12th, TED.com and charterforcompassion.org have just released six short talks on compassion from six different perspectives–from a Rabbi, an Imam, a Reverend, a Tenzin, a Swami, and a secular/scientific perspective. According to the Charter, “together, these six speakers bear witness to the fact that compassion and the Golden Rule lie at the heart of all religion and all morality.”
These quotes are among many profound, and beautiful images, truths, and teachings from late poet and philosopher, John O’Donohue in a 2008 conversation with Krista Tippett on Speaking of Faith. Read, then listen and be moved!
“In the Celtic tradition, there is a beautiful understanding of love and friendship. One of the fascinating ideas here is the idea of soul-love; the old Gaelic term for this is anam ċara. Anam is the Gaelic word for soul and ċara is the word for friend. … In the early Celtic church, a person who acted as a teacher, companion, or spiritual guide was called an anam ċara. It originally referred to someone to whom you confessed revealing the hidden intimacies of your life. With the anam ċara you could share your innermost self, your mind, and your heart. This friendship was an act of recognition and belonging. … In everyone’s life there is great need for an anam ċara, a soul friend, in this love you are understood as you are without mask or pretension. Where you are understood, you are at home.”
–from Anam Cara by John O’Donohue
“When I think of the word ‘beauty,’ some of the faces of those that I love come into my mind. When I think of beauty I also think of beautiful landscapes that I know. Then I think of acts of such lovely kindness that have been done to me, by people that cared for me, in bleak unsheltered times or when I needed to be loved and minded. I also think of those unknown people who are the real heroes for me, who you never hear about, who hold out on lines–on frontiers of awful want and awful situations and manage somehow to go beyond the given impoverishments and offer gifts of possibility and imagination and seeing.”
“The power of creativity is unique to human beings. We’re born with the capacity to project ourselves into other places. To be creative, you have to do something. It’s applied imagination.”
–Sir Ken Robinson, Author, The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything
“We know certain factors, including novelty, keeps the brain growing.”
–Daniel Siegel, Executive Director, Mindsight Institute
“Creativity is where we focus our attention. It’s about mental flexibility,” began Chris Wink, one of the founders of the Blue Man Group and more recently the Blue School, as he started the session on Creativity and Well-being at the Vancouver Peace Summit. Then, he launched us off into a performance presentation featuring three “bald and blue” men who playfully illustrated the mindsets or archetypes the Blue Man cast goes into in their performances (listed below with their opposite):
scientist (logical, analysis)-shaman (instinctive, focused on synthesis)
group member (sensitivity to others and collaboration)-the trickster (playfulness, breaking free of groupthink)
hero (moving toward a goal), and innocent (naïve, childlike, focused on being present)
Before each performance, Wink explained that the blue men get centered so they are not in any one mindset, but instead are able to access and move between any of them, something we could all benefit from practicing off the stage.
After taking us through each of the mindsets, he ended with the “innocent” asking each of us to reach back to a time when we expressed ourselves freely–when we ourselves were innocent. “We don’t enter this state often,” he said, “but we need to. We need to connect to our hearts.”
The theme had come full circle–once again–to the heart. Coming back again, and again.
Stepping into the cool gray, Seattle morning, I spotted the Yellow Cab hovering several feet from the curb. Little did I know the Vancouver Peace Summit would begin its work on me during my short cab ride to the train station. Though not a speaker on the summit agenda, my driver dispensed enduring advice.
After telling him where I was headed, Sunil, as I’ll call him here, gave me his prescription for peace: yoga, meditation, natural power (vs. fossil fuels), and a positive disposition.
Having grown up in northern India, the son of a farmer, Sunil told me he finds a special peace in his visits to a local park, listening to bird songs, the sound of a breeze blowing through the leaves, and water lapping against the shore. There he meditates.
As I gathered money for the fare, he shared a Sanskrit story illustrating the interconnectedness of the world and how it both belongs to and requires the guardianship of us all, but I’d mess it up in trying to retell it here…
He handed me my suitcase, we said our good-byes, and I turned to walk into the train station, his words lingering in my mind.
Tell us about someone who embodies love, forgiveness, compassion, or peace in your life by commenting on this entry.
