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Reconciliation: Deep Listening
Suffering plays a very important part in making happiness; where there is no mud, there is no lotus. The Kingdom of God is not a place without suffering, but a place where people know how to make good use of suffering to create understanding and love. In relationships, we must help each other understand the suffering inside of us by practicing compassionate listening. Listening to another person for one hour with the sole intention of helping them suffer less requires keeping compassion alive in the heart to protect against irritation and anger. Loving speech is then used to restore communication and reconcile, admitting that we have reacted badly because we did not understand the other person’s difficulties, and asking for their help to understand what is in their heart.
When coming home to the body, there may be tension, stress, and pain. The fourth exercise of mindful breathing is to allow the body to release this tension. It is possible to release tension in all the four positions of the body:
- Sitting
- Walking
- Standing
- Lying down
Mindful walking allows every step to release tension and bring healing. By stopping thinking and getting in touch with the wonders of life available in the here and the now—such as the blue sky, white clouds, and the people around—we are nourished and transformed. Walking like a free person, free from sorrow about the past and fear of the future, allows us to enter the Kingdom of God. The sunshine, the clouds, flowers, and our own bodies all belong to this Kingdom. We have more than enough conditions of happiness available right now; recognizing them causes joy to be born immediately. Breathing in, we say “I have arrived,” and breathing out, “I am home.” The Kingdom of God is our home, just as the ocean is the home of the waves, and the waves do not need to search for the ocean because they have the ocean within themselves.