WWUUD stream

🔒
❌ About FreshRSS
☷
△
There are new articles available, click to refresh the page.
Before yesterdayMain stream

Restoring Hearts

✇ WWUUD?
1 April 2019 at 04:08
By: Michael

I watched a man die today. Infirm with age, he was hobbling along with his cane as he went to the commissary window to buy a few snacks when, stepping backward, he bumped directly into Death.

Then men who care nothing for any of us were inconveniently compelled to try to restart the worn-out engine of life, now suddenly silent in his chest. They failed.

It occurs to me that restoration of a heartbeat shouldn’t be more difficult than the restoration of a human heart. People will work tirelessly to restore a heartbeat for a stranger, but shouldn’t we all work just as diligently to restore a “heart” for others? Perhaps even our own heart. Should we not work for restoration of hearts that are broken? Restoration for the lost and lonely and misguided in our world?

If the hearts of all people were restored to a state of kindness, what would our world look like? Almost everyone feels compassion for a sick child or an injured animal. So why don’t we feel the same way for others who are broken, lost and lonely? Why not for the prisoners, the addicts, the confused teenagers or the other down-trodden people all around us?

I believe that in every human heart, from the bitterest to the softest, there is a capacity for genuine kindness and compassion. Somehow, somewhere, something has buried that innate ability in too many people.

Whether we realize it or not, we all need restoration. Restoration of our heart’s deep compassion. Restoration of our faith in basic human goodness. Restoration of our sense of connection with one another and with all people. We need restoration of our genuine “heart” in order to continue, or even to begin, living our lives with real depth and fulfillment.

Attached media: https://web.archive.org/web/20211109232831/https://www.questformeaning.org/podcasts/19_04/04.mp3

You may be a Unitarian Universalist Joe

✇ WWUUD?
14 November 2018 at 17:01
By: (@Michael35036549)

You may be a Unitarian Universalist Joe

'Come and join us'

✇ WWUUD?
24 August 2017 at 03:26
By: Michael Hart

Service Auction April 22

✇ WWUUD?
20 April 2017 at 01:46
By: Michael Meyers-Jouan

Poster by: Liandra Pires

For a preview of the items we are offering, View the catalog here

Service Auction April 22

✇ WWUUD?
20 April 2017 at 01:46
By: Michael Meyers-Jouan

Poster by: Liandra Pires

For a preview of the items we are offering, View the catalog here

Service Auction April 22

✇ WWUUD?
20 April 2017 at 01:46
By: Michael Meyers-Jouan

Poster by: Liandra Pires

For a preview of the items we are offering, View the catalog here

Meeting of @IndivisibleMIA this Sunday, 12 March, from 6-8PM at Unitarian Universalist Church 7701 SW 76th Avenue, #Miami, FL 33143 #MIA

✇ WWUUD?
10 March 2017 at 01:48
By: (@michaelcdeibert)

Meeting of @IndivisibleMIA this Sunday, 12 March, from 6-8PM at Unitarian Universalist Church 7701 SW 76th Avenue, #Miami, FL 33143 #MIA

Meeting of @IndivisibleMIA this Sunday, 12 March, from 6-8PM at Unitarian Universalist Church 7701 SW 76th Avenue, #Miami, FL 33143 #MIA

Centering: A Little Bit At A Time

✇ Quest for Meaning
1 November 2021 at 00:05
By: Rev. Dr. Michael Tino

REV. DR. MICHAEL TINO 
Lead Ministry Team, Church of the Larger Fellowship

If there is to be peace in the world,
There must be peace in the nations.
If there is to be peace in the nations,
There must be peace in the cities.
If there is to be peace in the cities,
There must be peace between neighbors.
If there is to be peace between neighbors,
There must be peace in the home.
If there is to be peace in the home,
There must be peace in the heart.

—Taoist philosopher, Lao-Tse, sixth  century BCE

Centering

PHOTO BY JUNE WONG ON UNSPLASH

Philosophers and theologians throughout the ages have pondered the roots of peace, and have come to the conclusion that peace between and among people is not possible without smaller bits of peace, especially peace within oneself. “Let there be peace on Earth and let it begin with me,” the popular song goes.

Peace within oneself is the challenge of centering: How do we center ourselves? How do we go within and cultivate peace?

Many people turn to spiritual practices to do this. Spiritual practices are regular things that we do that connect us with something greater than ourselves, and there is not one right way for everyone to engage in them. We each need to figure out what it is that gives us that feeling of inner peace, of centering.

But the trick to spiritual practice is doing it regularly, and if we’re already overwhelmed by the world or our circumstances, one more thing to add to our day is just one more thing to knock us off of our center, one more thing to cause anxiety instead of cultivating peace.

I have begun to think about this differently.

Instead of carving out twenty minutes to sit in meditation, or an hour to walk a labyrinth every day, I find moments of spiritual centering throughout the day.

In giving advice to people in caring professions about cultivating peace and centering themselves, psychologist Ashley Davis Bush writes about “micro-practices,” one-moment-long glimpses of peace and mindfulness. Bush encourages people to fit them in throughout the day—in the pauses and cracks around other things, with no pressure or timeline or necessary outcome.

Take a breath. Notice how the air moves in and out of your body. Just one long, slow, deliberate breath.

Drink a glass of water. Feel it fill your body and think about how you will absorb that water.

Take just a moment and visualize in your mind something that makes you feel happy, or calm, or connected, or grounded. Choose an image and come back to it­—just for a few seconds—throughout the day.

Choose a few words to guide you, and repeat them in your mind every now and then, whenever you’re feeling unmoored. “I am grounded,” perhaps, or “I am loved.”

Spend a moment acknowledging the difficulties in your life right now. They are real. You are real. Your pain is real, too, but it does not own you.

Find a way—a small way—every day to connect to another person. Write a letter to your pen pal. Smile at a friend, or if it’s safe to do so, a stranger. Help someone out. Cultivate the knowledge that you are not alone in this world.

Think of something you’re thankful for. Take just a moment to feel gratitude.

Say something kind to yourself.

These practices don’t need to be long—ideally they’re just a minute, a moment, a breath. And they are all ways to connect to our center, to cultivate peace within our hearts, and to connect to something beyond our individual being.

Let peace begin with you. Let peace begin in your heart. Find your center, a little bit at a time.

❌