Episode 132: Cherishing Others, The Basis of All Good Qualities

03/14/22 • 34 min

The Buddha said that the minds of his followers should “constantly, day and night, delight in spiritual practice.” What practice can we weave through our days and use our own life as a spiritual path? What practice can we do at work, at home, with strangers, children, parents, and our partner? Cherishing others is a practice we can do whenever we have an intention; in other words, wherever we are awake. Cherishing others directly opposes our own selfishness, also known as self-cherishing. Cherishing another means that we have the intention: your happiness is important. I myself will work for your happiness.

Cherishing others has so many benefits. It is the basis of all good qualities, and, if practiced until it is our only intention, will lead to enlightenment. Cherishing others solves all problems between ourselves and others. Conversely, selfishness leads to pain and conflict; it is the foundation of all suffering. In this episode, JoAnn Fox explains how to practice cherishing others in daily life. She also guides a short meditation on cherishing those closest to us.

Modern science reveals that cherishing others even has health benefits. A study in The Journals of Gerontology found that “in an ethnically diverse group of older adults, those who gave social support to others experienced much lower rates of mortality compared with those who didn’t offer assistance.”

Cherishing others can also reduce levels of the stress hormone cortisol. A study in the journal Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science found that people who “practiced a kindness mindset had 23% lower cortisol levels than the average person.” Chronically high cortisol has been linked to health conditions like cardiovascular disease, weight gain, osteoporosis, insulin resistance, and diabetes. So cherishing others is good for your health!

Always wide awake

Are the disciples of Gotama

Whose minds constantly, day and night,

Delight in spiritual practice.

-Buddha, The Dhammapada

If you are interested in learning how you can work with JoAnn Fox as a Life/Spiritual Coach, visit https://buddhismforeveryone.com/coaching

References and Links

Buddha.The Dhammapada. Translated by Gil Fronsdale. (Kindle). Shambala, Boston and London, 2011, pp. 76

Sweet, Joni (Feb. 2021). How Random Acts of Kindness Can Boost Your Health During the Pandemic. Very Well Mind. https://www.verywellmind.com/how-random-acts-of-kindness-can-boost-your-health-5105301

Always wide awake

Are the disciples of Gotama

Whose minds constantly, day and night,

Delight in spiritual practice.

-Buddha, The Dhammapada

If you are interested in learning how you can work with JoAnn Fox as a Life/Spiritual Coach, visit https://buddhismforeveryone.com/coaching

References and Links

Buddha.The Dhammapada. Translated by Gil Fronsdale. (Kindle). Shambala, Boston and London, 2011, pp. 76

Sweet, Joni (Feb. 2021). How Random Acts of Kindness Can Boost Your Health During the Pandemic. Very Well Mind. https://www.verywellmind.com/how-random-acts-of-kindness-can-boost-your-health-5105301

Previous Episode

Episode 131 - Harmlessness

The Buddha spoke many times of the importance of practicing harmlessness. The most harmful mind is the mind of anger. The nature of anger is that it wishes to harm its object. Just as the nature of fire is to burn, the nature of anger is to harm. In this episode, we look at the causes of anger and conflict in our hearts. Sometimes we are at war with someone, a family member, a person at work, with society, our government, or a political party. We can understand and touch the war within ourselves. We can lay our conflicts down and experience peace where there was pain and turmoil.

How does anger arise? Anger observes an object it finds unpleasant, dwells with inappropriate attention on the faults of that object. Then anger arises when the mind has become unpeaceful and uncontrolled. The great Buddhist Master Shantideva said there are two reasons we get angry: when we don’t get what we want and when we have to put up with things we don’t want.

Edict of ancient Rome was: “If you want peace, you must prepare for war.” The result of this traditional way of thinking: 2,000 years of war, misery, destruction and annihilation. Millions of serious casualties. In the atomic age it is now high time we reversed this motto: “If you want peace, you must prepare for peace.” This means disarming instead of rearming.”

—Dalai Lama

Inner peace in the minds of human beings is the only foundation upon which a last outer peace--a world without war--is possible. The way to heal ourselves and society is the same. Loving-kindness and compassion are the antidotes to anger and hatred. A powerful antidote to anger is to accept people as they are. Another is having compassion for their struggles and personality quirks. We all have a personality quirk or two...Thich Nhat Hanh says that "We are challenged to apply an antidote as soon as anger arises, because of the far-reaching social effects of individual anger."

A profound understanding of interdependence arises when we see others with compassion and take universal responsibility for the correlation between our inner peace and outer, or world peace. The vast web of life is such that the action of one person reverberates across the entire web. Do we have a universal responsibility to end the war within ourselves as an act of nonviolence and peace for the whole world?

Always wide awake

Are the disciples of Gotama

Whose minds constantly, day and night,

Delight in harmlessness.

-Buddha, The Dhammapada

If you are interested in learning how you can work with JoAnn Fox as a Life/Spiritual Coach, visit https://buddhismforeveryone.com/coaching

References and Links

Buddha.The Dhammapada. Translated by Gil Fronsdale. (Kindle). Shambala, Boston and London, 2011, pp. 75-76

Dalai Lama. Our Only Home: A Climate Appeal to the World Kindle Edition. Disarming instead of rearming. pp. 87

Next Episode

Episode 133 - A Simple Happiness Practice

It could be said that all of the Buddha's teachings are about suffering and how to end suffering. In this episode, we hear the story of a monk who, standing alone in his monastery while the rest of his city celebrated the festival of the constellations, thought: "There can be no one whose lot is worse than mine." Haven't we all had a similar thought before when we were down, thinking our situation was just the worse! To the monk, the Buddha said that everyone suffers. Buddha says it is hard to be a monk; it is hard to be married with a family; it is hard just to live with other people. Ultimately Buddha said that anyone in samsara (with an uncontrolled mind) would experience suffering wherever their circumstances are. The only way to end suffering is to stop the causes of suffering from within--from our mental habits of ignorance, anger, attachment, greed, and so forth.

Understanding that suffering and happiness arise from our mind, rather than external circumstances, we can try to lift our mind back up to happiness as a spiritual practice. I suggest a one-day practice as an experiment. For this mindfulness practice, try for an entire day to keep lifting your mind back up when it becomes tense or unhappy. Utilize thoughts of gratitude or simply your determination to be peaceful and happy all day. I do this practice and find it really works! Just know that sometimes turning your mind back to happiness is easy, like turning a motorbike, but sometimes it is like turning a cruise ship around--it takes a long time.

Verse 302: It is hard to become a bhikkhu;

it is hard to be happy in the practice of a bhikkhu.

The hard life of a householder is painful;

to live with those of a different temperament is painful.

A traveller in samsara is continually subject to dukkha;

therefore, do not be a traveller in samsara;

do not be the one to be subject to dukkha again and again.

-Buddha, The Dhammapada

References and Links

Buddha.The Dhammapada: Verses and Stories. Translated by Daw Mya Tin, M.A. Edited by Editorial Committee, Burma Tipitaka Association Rangoon, Burma, 1986 (Online). Courtesy of Nibbana.com

Link: https://www.tipitaka.net/tipitaka/dhp/verseload.php?verse=302