Practicing love
Spent about eight hours at my desk yesterday without moving except to get coffee and sodas. I was doing a final revision on my story Mackerel Sky which I'm going to send off today.
Busy today ... a meeting, trip to the post office, a story to edit and lots of calls to make. I hoped to wake up earlier but it's so easy to sleep in the winter.
I read yesterday about a routine day for the Dalai Lama ... he wakes at 3:30 a.m. for prayers, walks every day for 1 1/2 hours, spends several hours reading sacred scriptures and in meditation.
I've been working on some of his concepts, especially the idea of being "wisely selfish." The Dalai Lama says that when you place others above yourself, the result is that you are happier.
The book I'm reading right now, The Essential Dala Lama, contains a chapter on how to develop bodhichitta, which is loosely, good will and love toward others.
There are several ways to think about others to help develop concern for them. He suggests that in the end, compassion should be a rational response and that we should not rely on spontaneous emotion, because that is changing.
Living by rationality ... instead of by depending on emotional inspiration for everything ... can bring a lot of advantages.
