This weekend, for my whole life really, I have struggled with being generous of spirit. My inclination is to tighten up in a ball, fix my eyes until they are steely and purse my lips really tight. To not give in. To not be nice. To not be generous with my words or actions.
I know. You aren't like that. You are perfectly filled with love and grace. You give and give and give.
At least I think you do because I compare myself to the imaginary you all the time. I figure everyone else is easily loving. Easily able to accept that others get more then they do. Easily able to share in someone else's good fortune.
Not me. I'm a meany.
But I don't want to be. Really.
I want to be loving and kind and filled with generous words of spirit - and mean it.
I really do want you to be happy, successful, filled with joy and all the things that make you happy. It just takes me a minute to get there.
What happens is like a quick monster overcomes my heart and I feel myself tense up into a knot as it grabs all the kind words out of my throat and stuffs them in to my belly. My fists clench into tight balls and I stop breathing as I press my lips tighter and tighter together. My eyes go into slits as they zero in on the target.
If I can just take one breath, I can move through that feeling into something else. Sometimes it takes just a moment and I remind myself what I really want for others - not the stinginess that swells inside. Other times it takes months, maybe even years.
It is why I sit and why I write. I journal to process all of that. To get it out on paper. To move past it. I sit in mediation, however badly, to do the same thing. My mind wanders off to relive the painful moment or the why not me moment and then I remind myself and go back to my breath. It is all a process.
Sometimes it is easier, sometimes not, but at least I am trying. So, if I, at first, seem cold or distant I am probably taming my inner monster. Give me a minute... I'll come around.