the four immeasurables — leave nothing untouched

   

 

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The fourteenth-century Tibetan master Longchenpa said there are five characteristics we should cultivate in order to practice the four immeasurables — loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity: 

(1) a fundamental attitude as vast as space;
(2) a mind as constant as the depths of the ocean;
(3) seeing all occurrences, inner and outer, as mist floating in the sky;
(4) a compassionate attitude as even as the rays of the sun 
(5) sensing negativities to be like specks of dust in our eyes.

—Longchenpa

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Return to the most human, nothing less will nourish the torn spirit, the bewildered heart, the angry mind: and from the ultimate duress, pierced with the breath of anguish, speak of love.

Return, return to the deep sources, nothing less will teach the stiff hands a new way to serve, to carve into our lives the forms of tenderness and still that ancient necessary pain preserve.

Return to the most human, nothing less will teach the angry spirit, the bewildered heart; the torn mind, to accept the whole of its duress, and pierced with anguish… at last, act for love.

—May Sarton
Unison Benediction

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Whatever experience is present
you clearly see right there,
right there—not taken in,
unshaken: that’s how you develop the heart.


—Shakyamuni Buddha
View of an Auspicious Day

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