And they will hear the bird begin to sing and the stream begin to flow again, with hope reborn and energy restored to walk with lightened step along the road that suddenly seems easy as they go.
ACIM Lesson 109: 7:3
Sending Hope and Light to Those who Suffer
That is what I want for all those who are suffering. I want them to experience the hope and renewed energy this season brings and to find their roads suddenly easy. I want to see them transcend this long dark and dreary winter for the beautiful light of spring. I see my loved ones in so much pain and at first I felt so helpless. I didn't know what to "do". I realize after reading Lesson 109...healing isn't so much what we do as it is how we choose to "be".
What Helps more: Being or Doing?
Could it be that we do more for the suffering in this world when we go inward, sort out the fiction from the Truth in our own minds and allow ourselves to just rest in God...than we ever will with all we do? Could it be that we effect more positive change in the world with meditation, stillness and quiet than we do with activity?
The Maharishi Effect
The studies done on understanding the Maharishi effect lean towards this possibility.
It has been shown in several different studies (very well done studies) that crime rate in cities go down if at least 1 % of the population meditates.(http://www.trancenet.org/maharishieffect.htm) Wow! Crime is just one behavioural response to fear emotion and ego induced thinking...one manifestation of "suffering".
What else happened during those studies, I wonder, that wasn't being picked up by researchers? Were people generally feeling better in those cities where the crime rate went down? Was there more collective hope? Would there have been more feelings of peace reported amongst those who were not even aware other people were meditating?
Science and Buddhism
I am also reading about and from Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, a renown and well followed Tibetan meditation master who has undergone several scientific tests at the University of Wisconsin on the neurological effects of meditation. These tests, done on long term meditators ( those with more than 10,000 hours of meditation in their life times) showed remarkable results in comparison to other non meditators or much less experienced meditators when asked to meditate on compassion and loving kindness during the tests. So much so that when the tests were first performed on Rinpoche experimenters thought the machines were broken. Wow! (Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche and Daniel Goldman ( 2007) The Joy of Living. Random House Canada) Meditation actually changes our brains, improving our capacity to feel compassion and kindness. Meditation brings peace to self and the unified Self ( all those around us).
Meditation brings peace
I know when I come to after a meditation I am often surprised to find myself surrounded by peacefully sleeping dogs and cats who were not in the room with me when I began. It is almost if they get pulled into that energy. And I am just one far from perfect meditator. What would happen to depression and other forms of suffering in a community if we could get more people to meditate?
I may never know but I make it a point to intend healing, peace, and light for those who I know are suffering as I close my eyes. I like to think it helps. According to A Course in Miracles and the results from science, it does. :)
All is well in my world.
References
ACIM
Transcendental Meditation (n.d.) Scientia. Retrieved from http://www.trancenet.org/maharishieffect.htm
Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche and Daniel Goldman ( 2007) The Joy of Living. Random House Canada
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