I had a crucial insight this week.
In Tergar's Joy of Living program we're meditating on neutral objects. Mingyur Rinpoche suggests something in the distance like a patch of color on a wall. He also describes a process by which our sense of distinction between self and object dissolves after a while.
I wasn't sure what he meant until I experienced it myself. For one meditation I picked a boring white square pattern on the apartment building outside my window. I steeled myself for what I was sure would be the dullest meditation I'd ever experienced. But in time something happened. I began to see the contrasting bricks and then the bricks that were diagonal to it. In time, I saw that pattern as a symbol of myself. Solid, negative space around me, brick upon brick, held in place by gravity but able to hold people up way above the ground. The next day I had a similar experience with the excess cord on a clothesline. I saw myself in time as that piece of cord, suspended in the sky. Not heavy enough to fall. But strong enough to stay in place. I saw the perfect tension of the clothesline as the tension I need to maintain in my practice.
If I see myself in nondescript objects, then surely I must see myself in everyone I meet. If I'm feeling vulnerable and stressed and angry and closed hearted, then I'm going to see everyone as that. But if my mind is strengthened and renewed by compassion and gratitude, then I'm more likely to see everyone around me as compassionate and generous.
Now the dedication I do at the beginning of my meditation makes sense. This meditation really is work I do for all beings. I'm more likely to see the good in people as a result of this practice, and in seeing the good in them, I'm more likely to feel good. It's a positive feedback loop that in time develops its own momentum.
One day I will not have to work so hard at this. And when I say I work for the welfare of others I will mean that I "work," in the sense of I function mechanically how I'm supposed to. Like the clothesline, like the bricks, which I rarely notice, but for which today I am deeply grateful.
