Dear Friends ~ Having just watched the documentary on Mr. Rogers, entitled "Won't You Be My Neighbor?" it struck me that he possessed, like the Dalai Lama, that quality of presence that held each and every one within his perfectly still and attentive gaze, wrapping them in heartfelt reassurance of their worth. He seems to have spent his life telling each person he met —whether child, prisoner, or co-worker— that they are loved just the way they are. Yet how many ways do we try to change ourselves or others? How many qualifiers or conditions do we put on a person's value or worthiness to be loved? And what does it mean to be our best selves? We need to reach for growth and change while knowing also that, at our core, who we are is just right. Sometimes the hardest one to believe that about is ourselves. Perennial plants in my garden have turned from greens to tawny browns and yellows, some withering on their now-brittle stems. Yet they will return in spring, their newly greening leaves and buds another version of their same selves, because encoded deep within their roots they know who they are meant to be. With people it's harder to see the core because we cannot separate who a person is from what he or she does. Yet I cannot teach a child to change if the message is "you are bad" but I can teach a child that they are good even when a particular action or behavior is not. Perhaps if more children had ingrained in them at an early age the sense that they are inexhaustibly good and lovable for who they are deep inside, they would be able to act in ways that reflected their true selves. The child of God inside each one of us, no matter how old, still needs to hear that message of unconditional love.
Nature is the great teacher, the book of life to be read and understood. That's why it is important not just to protect the natural world, but to guide it to the highest level of perfection. Our task as spiritual people is to foster an intimate bond between the world of nature--rivers, mountains, oceans, animals, forests--and our own felt nature. When one is thriving, the other will find needed support.