Looking Back

You know, or maybe you don’t, the saying of don’t live your life looking in the rear view mirror. Meaning don’t get caught in a preoccupation with the past and miss the gift of the present moment. At the same time, there are points in life where looking back is part of moving forward. If we can look back with the eyes of love and compassion and a gentle curiosity, we may see energetic patterns or habits that no longer serve.

When I lived in Plum Village with the monastic and Lay community of Thich Nhat Hanh, I received so many jewels that will stay with me through out my life. One was when I was talking with a nun who said, “when people are unskillful in some way, they are doing what they know how to do. They don’t know another way to do it.” It was such an aha moment. Learn other ways to do it that work better, and then find a way to weave those things into life and unweave the things that I may have learned unconsciously that have become habitual ways of being or behaving.

Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh, is one of the rare individuals in my life who so fully embodies unconditional love and the people who practice with him also do the same. My more habitual reaction can be…’piss me off…I’m gone’. And even if I don’t look like I’m gone, I am gone. I guess you could call that…human being doing it’s automatic conditioned program. It was such a deep experience to be in the presence of some one who just deeply loved and accepted all of me, even though I know that he knows my short comings. There’s really no words for it. The power of unconditional love is beyond words.

If we can learn to look at ourselves with those same eyes of acceptance and non judgement who knows what might be possible. We may be able to do so for others in time too. I’ve been conditioned in a different way, but I am masterful in being willing to shift my own programming, so that in time I may teach and facilitate others in doing the same. Looking back, I can come back to my awareness of the power of unconditional love and I can start releasing those patterns within myself that can block that experience.

We all have blocks, or most of us have blocks to the experience of unconditional love or else the world we live in would look a lot different. It is a flow in and out and if we can allow unconditional love in, it is also possible to allow that to flow out. As children this is a natural thing, it is effortless, it is what we are wired for. But then we get rewired at an early stage by fear and judgement and on and on. So there are times when it is worth taking a minute or two to look back, and see what is it that I am afraid of? What is it that can be released now to let more love flow through life? Deer friend, thank you for helping me take a heartfelt look back…you always know the way forward!