Beyond "No Judgment"

I like having mantras and affirmations...positive and helpful phrases that bubble up consistently in my thoughts as I navigate life.

Often I keep one around for a while. It's my default "self-talk."

During a whole year recently, the words "no judgment" were consistently present. 

Hopefully, they've created a recurring groove in my neural pathway (or whatever it's called)!

Today, I started hearing a new phrase, based on the teachings of Joanna Macy, revered Buddhist environmental activist who passed away this month at age 96. Her words "Compassion and Interbeing" keep showing up in my mind.

Well, not really just in my mind. They seem to create a tangible, somatic pause before any words or even thoughts take shape.

Interbeing is a term coined by Thich Nhat Hanh, beloved Buddhist monk and peace activist, who passed away a couple of years ago. I have mostly used the word "Oneness" to describe what to me is a real sense of nondual existence, a real sense of connectedness. Interbeing speaks to that experience, in an even bigger way, including all life.

As I began this blog entry, I looked for, and found, an image to use. I was surprised to discover that I had used this same image, this same Dalai Lama quote, in a relationship article written almost 20 years ago!

That article, Jumping from Judgment to Love, also quoted Mother Theresa: "If you judge people, you have no time to love them."

So am I just repeating myself, not having fully learned this amazing lesson yet? Well, yes, that might certainly be true. I accept it as true.

But what I'm excited about right now is the inner sense of the difference this different phrasing creates. 

"No judgment" is a reminder to drop judgment. I experience it as a pull back, something that actually stops me from being judgmental on the inside (which usually keeps it from being expressed on the outside!)

Compassion and Interbeing is diffrent kind of reminder. It stimulates an outgoing energy flow. I feel myself literally entering into that Oneness with whomever/whatever sparked the mantra... even if it's my own self. 

I feel the same outgoing energy flow when I remember to tell Richard he's perfect, as I desribed long ago in my article.

Compassion and Interbeing is the experience of LOVE, expanded to include, yes, ALL LIFE. It's an outflow, that starts from within.

I hereby invite this reminder/mantra to surround and fill me for a long time, maybe forever, if needed, since I seem to be a slow learner.

Or perhaps it will simply merge into the one word, LOVE, which is always behind and beyond "no judgment"... and... no separation. Oneness. Interbeing.