Of those
you would like to punish
You would feel a sorrow and
suffering
Enough to disarm all your hostility.
HW Longfellow
Now for the most important GIFT you can give YOURSELF... FORGIVENESS. Most of
us think that forgiveness is about the person(s) whom we believe have harmed us
in any way. It's not. The letting go and release of the rage, anger, bitterness
of hostility relieves your system of the toxicity of those emotions. The
following prayer from Rabbi Michael Lerner of www.Tikkun.org says it powerfully. Many
blessings to all of you.
Stewart L. Levine, Esq.,
Resolutionary, Author
of Getting to
Resolution, The
Book of Agreement and
The Change Handbook, 2d Edition, Chapter
52.
www.ResolutionWorks.com 510-777-1166 510-814-1010 cell
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Bedtime
Prayer of Forgiveness
YOU, my ETERNAL FRIEND, WITNESS now that I forgive anyone who hurt or upset
me or who offended me-
- damaging my body, my property, my reputation
- or damaging people that I love ~ whether by accident or purposely ~
with words, deeds, thoughts or attitudes.
I forgive every person who has hurt or
upset me.
May no one be punished because of me.
May no one suffer from karmic consequences for hurting or upsetting me.
Help me, Eternal Friend, to keep from offending You and others.
Help me to
be thoughtful and not commit outrage by doing what is evil in Your eyes.
Whatever sins I have committed, blot out, please, in Your abundant kindness,
and spare me suffering or harmful illnesses.
Help me become aware of the ways I may have unintentionally or intentionally
hurt others,
- and please give me guidance and strength to rectify those
hurts--- and to develop the sensitivity to not continue acting in a hurtful
way.
Let me forgive others,
- let me forgive myself--but also let me
change in ways that make it easy for me to avoid paths of hurtfulness to
others.
I seek peace, let me BE peace.
I seek justice, let me be just.
I seek
a world of kindness, let me be kind.
I seek a world of generosity, let me be
generous with all that I have.
I seek a world of sharing, let me share all
that I have.
I seek a world of giving, let me be giving to all around
me.
I seek a world of love-- let me be loving beyond all reason,
beyond
all normal expectation, beyond all societal frameworks that tell me how much
love is "normal,"
- beyond all fear that giving too much love will leave me with too
little.
And let me be open and sensitive to all the love that is already
coming to me,
- the love of people I know,
- the love that is part of
the human condition,
- the accumulated love of past generations that
flows through and is embodied in the language,
- music, recipes,
technology,
- literature, religions, agriculture,
- and family
heritages that have been passed on to me and to us.
Let me pass that love
on to the next generations in an even fuller and more explicit way.
Source of goodness and love in the universe, let me be alive to all the
goodness that surrounds me.
And let that awareness of the goodness and love
of the universe be my shield and protector.
Hear the words of my mouth and may the meditations of my heart find
acceptance before You, Eternal Friend, who protects and frees me.
Amen.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Composed by Rabbi Michael Lerner based on the previous writing
of Rabbi Zalman Schachter Shalomi. If you wish us help to spread the
consciousness represented in this prayer, please join our Interfaith
organization The Network of Spiritual Progressives (which is also open to
atheists and agnostics who don't relate to organized religion but who do
acknowledge a spiritual dimension to life and reality). Please join us at
www.spiritualprogressives.org
or by calling 510 644 1200 or by emailing Nichola@Tikkun.org or
RabbiLerner@Tikkun.org. And please help us build this
movement.
If you like this letter, please feel free to send it
to everyone you know! And please direct them to our website www.spiritualprogressives.org.
