So today we are on the third capacity.
We have these boundless states that we are exploring are known as the Brahma Viharas.
The Brahma Viharas,
They are considered divine homes for our hearts and our minds.
And with all of these four Brahma Viharas,
These divine abodes of loving kindness,
Of compassion,
Sympathetic joy and equanimity,
I think it's very useful and important to see them as an expression or a manifestation of our inner freedom.
A metaphor for inner freedom is an open heart.
The doors of the heart are open.
So if there's a locking on the door,
If there's a lock on the door,
Then the heart,
It's not open right?
In some way what the lock does is it protects us from the suffering of others,
The difficulties of the world.
We don't take it in,
You know,
We kind of keep everything at bay.
But it's at a pretty tremendous cost because any way in which the doors to the heart are locked,
They also lock us from our capacity for joy and happiness,
For love and kindness.
So if those doors can be wide open,
What we discover is that we'll take in and experience all of the world,
The suffering of the world,
The joy of the world,
But it flows kind of right through almost as if the heart is just a door.
And to have that door wide open,
Everything can go through it.
We experience the suffering of the world more acutely with the door open,
But we don't suffer because of it.
We're not a victim of it,
But we do experience it.
And the ability to experience the suffering of the world is the very way of being that kind of allows us to experience joy and happiness more.
So with the door wide open,
We experience the suffering and we can have compassion,
Right.
And if we experience the joy,
We can also feel the delight of that.
So today I'd like to explore this third Brahma Vihara,
Spiritual joy.
It's known as Mudita in the Pali language.
And it's the capacity that we have to take in joy and happiness,
To delight in the pleasures of life,
To delight in the pleasures that other people experience.
And some of the most classic discussions in these practices of the Brahma Viharas,
These sort of four divine homes for the heart and mind,
They talk about how we can use ourselves as an example for understanding the well-being of others.
So to cultivate loving kindness for oneself,
It's not meant to be kind of self focused or selfish.
It's really meant to be a preparation for us to be able to do loving kindness towards the world around us.
So the description says by having oneself as an example,
This is what it's like to have love or this is what it's like to receive kindness from someone.
Then there's more of an embodiment and more of a sense of understanding of how to connect to and understand others,
To offer them that same well-being when we experience it within ourselves.
So it's the same thing with Mudita,
With this appreciative joy.
Sometimes it's hard to do it for oneself,
But to the degree to which you can have some sense of recognizing ourselves,
Something to affirm in ourselves,
Like yes,
This is good.
This is a good thing about myself.
And even if 99% of ourselves is not so good,
Maybe there's 1% that's appropriate to affirm,
You know,
Or maybe it's 10% or 55% or whatever.
There's this percentage that's good in oneself to affirm it and to celebrate it and enjoy it and appreciate it.
It's sad not to feel some appreciation or joy for ourselves because we're kept hostage by what's not so good about ourselves.
You know,
We all have shortcomings.
Everyone has something that they could find in themselves,
Like these psychological warts,
You know.
It comes with being a human being on this planet.
But it's sad to focus so much on that,
That we deny or ignore or push aside the parts of us that are actually really good and wholesome and happy.
So when we can spend some time appreciating that which is wholesome and good in ourselves,
To feel joy in ourselves and appreciation,
What we can appreciate in our life and be grateful for,
Then it's easier to appreciate the joy in others.
So we don't want to make this a selfish practice.
But we can keep in mind that what we're doing by appreciating ourselves is that we're more able to offer appreciation and gratitude towards others.
That's really one of the greatest gifts of this life,
The ability to have genuine happiness and delight in the good fortune of other people.
You know,
It's a common belief that mudita,
This appreciative joy is the hardest Brahma Vihara.
Because often what comes when you hear of others good fortune is envy and jealousy,
Or we tend to feel bad about ourselves,
You know,
We're comparing ourselves to the other who is clearly happier than we are.
So all these complications come in,
You know,
And some people get mean and bitter about it,
The success of other people.
But this mudita is really dropping away of self preoccupation of selfishness and opening up.
So the way in is to experience one owns goodness,
Your own well being,
Your own joy,
Your own gratitude.
It's a means of really dissolving and letting go of self concern.
So it's a reference point or an ability inside of ourselves just to open up and to delight in the joy of others.
So there's no loss,
You know,
It's a joy that involves no loss,
It's a joy that involves no need or neediness.
We're not asserting ourselves onto people,
We have no agenda,
You know,
For what we want in the situation.
And we start with recognizing the goodness that's here.
You know,
Recognizing what we can appreciate here now.
And as we practice our own self appreciation,
We develop this greater capacity to be present to be grounded deeply inside where there is goodness.
You know,
Our lack of hostility,
Our meanness,
Our greed,
When we can start to see our goodness,
Then we have a reference point for how other people have that capacity as well.
So cultivating happiness for ourselves can be seen as part of the path to living for the welfare and happiness of others.
And it's also a path to greater and greater freedom.
Mudita,
This appreciative joy is seen as a practice that's freeing,
It frees us from having envy.
It frees us from having a closed heart.
There's a certain kind of freedom from fear that comes with appreciative joy,
Sympathetic joy.
So this ability to live with an open heart is to have a heart that's not closed in any way.
It's not closed down,
Not locking itself up.
In the way that jealousy and envy and fear and comparing might might feel like we get very disconnected by those experiences.
So this movement towards freedom that we're on together it occurs as we develop joy for others.
Things just keep opening up for us when we can experience authentic joy for others.
Joy is an opening.
It's an opening.
So these are my reflections this morning.
Thank you for your kind attention.
