Today we will open to a sense of gratitude for our emotions,
Our feelings,
This emotional dimension of our humanity.
And I want to remind you of a saying that you may have heard already,
And I think it's so beautiful,
By German mystic Meister Eckhart,
Who said,
If the only prayer I could utter would be,
Thank you,
That would suffice.
That's how close gratitude and grace are.
Gratitude is one of the most direct ways to open to grace,
And ingratitude is one of the biggest blocks we can have towards grace.
So developing a sense of gratitude,
Even if we don't feel it,
As a way of cultivating it,
Is very important.
So today we'll open up to a sense of gratitude for our emotional dimension.
So when you're already closing your eyes,
Finding a comfortable way to sit that is open and available,
And sensing into this subtle dimension of your humanity,
Your emotions,
Feeling what is present right now in your emotional world.
Sensing into your heart,
Chest area,
And opening it to whatever is there emotionally.
Because each of these flavors of feeling is a gift for us,
And we can be grateful for that.
So maybe you feel happy right now,
And there's a sense of joy or peace,
An open ingratitude for that happiness,
For the peace,
For the contentment.
It's very close to gratitude.
When we're truly happy,
We're always grateful.
We know this is a gift.
And then again,
Maybe you feel sad.
There's something that's saddening you.
There's a sense of loss or grief.
Maybe even a feeling of doubt or some flavor of sadness,
Which could be just a subtle,
Minor heaviness of the heart,
Or it could be a broken heart,
A deep grief,
So many flavors of sadness.
And if that's what you experience,
Can you open in gratitude to that?
It means that you feel you're allowing the movement of your heart.
If you're grieving something,
That means you love something or someone.
You opened your heart.
You let yourself open that much.
If you're sensing any kind of sense of anger,
Frustration,
Even rage,
Anything from a slight irritation to a full-blown rage,
If anything like that is going on for you,
Celebrate that.
Can you say thank you for that?
Because it means you are alive.
Maybe your boundary was crossed,
And that's why the anger is here,
To teach you that.
It always teaches us something.
It's very connected with our passion.
It's hot.
It's alive.
And it's like a volcano sometimes.
And it's a gift.
It shows you something.
Can you say thank you for that?
Even for the fear,
Can we be grateful for any flavor of fear,
Be it a slight anxiety or a strong fear?
It also teaches us something.
Sometimes it teaches us to take that scared part of ourselves by the hand.
It teaches us we need support.
We need something to feel safe.
Sometimes it teaches us to wait,
To not go forward with something.
There's something else we need first.
It teaches us about courage,
Because there really isn't any deep courage without learning how to transform our fear.
So you can see all these feelings are a gift.
And we wouldn't be alive without them.
We wouldn't be so flat,
So boring without our feelings,
Or with only one feeling.
So can you open in gratitude whatever is present for you,
And then tend to come and go,
And just say thank you for my emotions.
Thank you,
Thank you,
Thank you that I feel so much.
That I have such a rich,
Rich emotional life.
Take that into your meditation,
If that's what you're doing.
You can pause me here,
Come back when you're ready.
And before we get off the pillow,
Just taking the sense of gratitude for emotional aliveness with us,
And allowing these emotions without suppressing them,
Or without acting them out in our life.
Have a beautiful day.
