Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Seeing "Different" Differently

FROM DAVID:


My journey as a Son-Rise Program dad really got going with this idea taught at the Son-Rise Start-Up program:

"We are all doing the best we can with what [beliefs] we have."


Boom! There went the "blame game". Guilt? Gone. Wow! My son, Eidan (ay-den), was doing the best he could with autism and other issues. Ahhhhhh. No more would I think that he wasn't trying. (Now, two years later, it's mind-boggling to me that I ever held that belief.) I felt so relieved.

The belief that we're all doing our best gave me the ground on which I could give myself forgiveness for doing anger with my adorable children and equally adorable wife. It opened my eyes to loving other people that I judged. My vision of my childhood underwent a re-vision. Suddenly, I was changed.

Have you ever heard, maybe from a teacher in grade school correcting a classmate's words about someone's hairstyle, "It's not WEIRD. It's DIFFERENT."? I remember considering that as an enlightened position. But why distance ourselves from others by labeling them, their behavior, or their appearance "different"? Check this out:

"All are nothing but flowers in a flowering universe."
~ Nakagawa Soen-roshi


Right on, Nakagawa! I think that's another way of saying, "We are all doing the best we can with what we have." This is an enlightened position. Why? It feels lighter :)

Looking for and noticing the beauty in others, especially in their characteristics that may, at first, seem "weird" or "different" is a means to flow with and grow with the attitude of love and acceptance we use as Option Process mentors and working with children in Son-Rise Programs. Imagine yourself with the ability to love anything and go for it! Love it! The only thing that might be "different" is you.

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