RESOURCES AND RECAP
Led by: Valerie Brown
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In the Plum Village tradition of mindfulness meditation founded by Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh, we learn to notice and become aware when emotions are touched within us, to notice what the emotion feels like in the body, and to bring awareness to the feelings and bodily sensations, taking care of these emotions by calming and soothing the body and mind.
This month, we are thrilled to have Valerie Brown returning to lead another webinar. This time she will focus on How to Fight Injustice without Hating.
She goes on to share: Taking care of the emotions of anger and hate is an ongoing, daily, and moment to moment practice, especially now at this time when Black and Brown people are under attack from unlawful police violence, unconscious bias, and disparate treatment of Blacks during the COVID-19 health crisis. As a Black woman, my daily practice is to notice the sensation of hate in order to gain agency over my feelings, my words, and my actions and to recognize how I can support myself.
So, what skillful action is required at a time of hate, fear, and violence?
As an individual and as a society, we have been given specific instruction from countless people who sacrificed their lives through the Civil Rights Era and other social movements in how to take compassionate action in the face of violence, anger, and fear. We are instructed to meet police violence with non-violence. We are instructed to meet racist structures and systems with diligence with inner resilience born out of compassionate action. We are instructed to meet hatred with an open heart and to cultivate heartfulness because love, compassion, kindness, and peace are bigger than a heart constricted by hate, discrimination and violence.
In this online event, we will deepen our understanding of systemic racism and inequity and Anti-Black racism, and engage in mindfulness practices to calm the body and mind toward compassionate and skillful action.
Resources from the Webinar
Offering to the dead and to the living
Land Acknowledgement
POEMS
Poem by Dzung Vo.
i can’t breathe
said George Floyd
the knee of four hundred years of racism
on his neck
i can’t breathe
said the woman with fear
in her eyes
her lungs attacked by coronavirus
as she was put onto the ventilator
i can’t breathe
said the nurse, exhausted
after a long shift
sweating under a hot surgical mask
and foggy goggles
i can’t breathe
said the young man
poisoned by a toxic drug supply
and generations of trauma and loss
i can’t breathe
said the one hundred thousand
dead americans
a nation and a world
in mourning
i can’t breathe
said cities choked in smoke
from a planet on fire
breathe my dear
said the buddha of our time
reminding us of the way
to love and healing and transformation
breathe my dear
said the beloved community
grieving
and waking up together
breathe my dear
said mother earth
and let my oceans, mountains,
and forests embrace you
right now
when it seems so hard
just to breathe
right now
just breathe
Kaddish Symphony, or Why We Can’t Wait
Karen Erlichman
“Even if you have a PhD, a sugar daddy, health insurance, a good job, a nose job, a Grammy, a lawyer
Straighten your hair, your tie, your skirt
Shave your beard, shave your legs, take your meds
Change your name, change location, change clothes”
___________________
A Ritual to Read to Each Other
William Stafford
“For it is important that awake people be awake,
or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;
the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe —
should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.”
full poem here
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Kuan Yin’s Prayer for the Abuser
To those who cause agony to others,
I give the gift of free flowing tears.
To those who deny another's right to be,
I remind you that the angels sang in celebration of you on the day of your
birth.
To those who see only division and separateness,
I remind you that a part is born only by bisecting a whole.
————————
Other Resources:
Valerie Brown’s Lamp Transmission Gatha on the Occasion of her Lamp Transmission Ceremony June 2018, Plum Village, France
Ancestors invoking Winter becoming Spring.Releasing the grip of suffering to heart of compassion and boundless love.Aspirations as vast as the oceans and wide as the sky.With her lap full of flowers she surrenders to the Buddha’s voice.
Plum Village Gatha to Valerie:
In the true Sangha is the true Buddha.
The power of cutting through afflictions comes from the power of understanding.
All bow down un the spirit of oneness.
SHARINGS FROM JANICE JACKSON
Teaching Tolerance
National Equity Project
Race Forward