Opening the Heart ♡

Dear Friend,

I recently returned from a week-long self-retreat at a serene Tibetan Buddhist center in Niedersachsen. My daily schedule included 5–6 hours of meditation, 2–2.5 hours of yoga asana and pranayama, and about 2 hours of study and contemplation. The rest of the time I spent outside, taking in the sights, sounds, and air of the forest and surrounding fields.

As these retreats often go, my mind moved through many ebbs and flows, fluctuating through gross and subtle experiences. Maintaining a continuous flow of mindfulness keeps directing awareness to what is happening within—a state that rarely goes very deep during ordinary activities of daily life. I’ve done my share of meditation retreats over the years, but this was my first extended self-retreat, where I could follow my own schedule and diversify the practice for maximum effectiveness. It was very fruitful on many levels, leading to a few significant insights and breakthroughs. The main challenge, as always, is integrating the effects and realizations of a retreat into daily life.

Preparing different sources of inspiration, I picked up The Art of Happiness, which had been sitting on my bookshelf for a while. It’s written by an American psychiatrist based on his conversations with the Dalai Lama on different topics. Like many others, I too greatly admire him—probably the second most famous Buddhist in history (after the Buddha;-)—and a remarkable figure among current global leaders, one of the very few who remains true to his ethics, humility, wisdom, and genuine commitment to peace and shared humanity rather than divisiveness and conflict. And yet, his constant emphasis on compassion and positive human connection had always felt to me somewhat superficial and slightly excessive. I wondered why he was choosing to de-emphasize the Buddha’s teachings on the nature of mind and consciousness, mindfulness, and meditative insight, which are so profoundly valuable and wise. I also questioned whether overlooking the reality that some people truly intend harm raises concerns about whether calling for universal compassion might indirectly enable bad actors.

I decided to challenge my resistance and genuinely open myself to the Dalai Lama's teachings on compassion and altruism—curious to see how it would land.

The word “compassion” is often misunderstood. It comes from Latin: com (“with”) and passion (“suffering” or “pain”), as in “The Passion of Christ.” While often defined as “sympathetic pity and concern for the suffering and misfortune of others,” this doesn’t fully capture its meaning in Buddhist and yoga contexts.

As the days went by and I continued to read the Dalai Lama's answers to different questions on this topic, I began to realize how essential this aspect of the teachings is and that I hadn’t been giving it enough importance in my own practice. It became clearer why he places such emphasis on spreading this message: while many people may not be able to take on a formal meditation practice for various reasons, everyone can access their potential for compassion, which has tremendous power to improve quality of life both individually and collectively. As social primates, we depend on positive and fulfilling relationships on a primal psychological and biological level; without them, we suffer.

Practicing yoga and meditation regularly—learning to be mindful and equanimous with the constant fluctuations of the body and mind—can lead to inner peace and clarity. However, to translate that into true happiness and well-being, we must extend any meditative insight, wisdom, or progress outward as compassion and loving-kindness. Otherwise, we can reach deep states of meditation that ultimately reinforce self-centeredness and ego contraction, which will eventually bring suffering to ourselves and others. Sadly, history shows this clearly: some well-known yoga or meditation “athletes” who have attracted many followers and admirers due to their abilities have ended up causing harm to those who trusted them most, often due to an unexamined inflated ego and disregard for this essential aspect of practice.

Meditative insight and compassion are like two wings of a bird—if one is missing the bird will end up flying in circles.

Compassion is a form of love, but not in the conventional way we usually understand it. In English, “love” can refer to many things: “I love ice cream,” “I love my mother,” “I love nice weather.” Often, it implies a transactional relationship, expecting pleasure, gratification, or some reward in return. It is essentially a form of attachment or grasping, which is considered in Buddhist and yoga traditions an afflictive state—one that creates inner tension and contraction.

In the Tibetan language, there are multiple words for “love,” each pointing to different aspects of pure, unconditional love that are considered non-afflictive emotions. Compassion is called nyingjé, meaning “noble heart.”

The Dalai Lama describes it as follows:

”[Nyingjé] has a wealth of meaning that is difficult to convey succinctly, though the ideas it conveys are universally understood. It connotes love, affection, kindness, gentleness, generosity of spirit, and warm-heartedness. It is also used as a term of both sympathy and of endearment. On the other hand, it does not imply ‘pity’ as the word compassion may, on the contrary nyingjé denotes a feeling of connection with others, reflecting its origin in empathy…It is both the source and the result of patience, tolerance, forgiveness, and all good qualities.”

Practically speaking, compassion in Buddhism is the capacity to take in other beings’ suffering without being overtaken by it. It means holding ourselves steady, present, and fully open to others' pain, distress, misery, and darkness. This can feel like an intimidating, advanced practice that lies outside the realm of our current capacity. It is also very natural to fear absorbing others’ pain—we already carry enough of our own. However, when compassion is genuine, it feels natural and has the opposite effect—it reduces our own suffering.

Important disclaimer: Exploring the practice of compassion can heighten awareness of suffering in the world and may initially feel overwhelming, with a sense of heaviness or doom and gloom. It can also evoke frustration and helplessness at being unable to take concrete action to alleviate suffering. In extreme cases, it may even lead to physical discomfort or illness. In milder cases, we may simply feel resistance or think the practice “doesn’t work” for us. If you choose to give it a try, make sure you understand its purpose, seek proper guidance if needed, and avoid practicing when feeling anger, aversion, despair, or any other negative emotional state.

A practice from the Tibetan Buddhist tradition that can be interesting to explore is called Tonglen, meaning “giving (or sending) and taking.” We take in others’ pain and suffering (compassion) and send out loving-kindness. Like many meditation practices, it is based on the breath.

Starting at a basic level, we sit quietly in a meditation position and bring to mind someone who is suffering—physically, emotionally, or otherwise—someone we truly care about or feel empathy for. They might be old or sick, or maybe going through a hard time emotionally, or even having to deal with some financial debt or lawsuits or something like that. 

With each in-breath, we imagine taking in their suffering like a vacuum cleaner, drawing in their pain, misery, and negativity, pulling their dark energy from them and breathing it in. We take it down into the center of the chest, the heart, visualizing a small black pearl representing the "self-cherishing mind"—our ego, the part of our mind that thinks, "I am very sorry that you suffering, but I'm glad it's not me". If resistance or fear arises, worrying that taking in other people's pain might infect us with it, we observe it carefully and proceed gently, or even stop altogether, we may not be ready for it yet. This uncomfortable feeling is actually the whole point of this practice, it reveals to us so clearly the deeply rooted self-involved tendencies of the mind.

This intake of suffering into the heart has a unique potential to dissolve momentarily the egoic impulses that cause internal contraction, and the release of that is transformed into an expansive quality of loving-kindness, a genuine wish for others to be happy and well. Loving-kindness has nothing to do with the ego, it does not contain even a trace of some transactional self-serving intention. In a way, it is almost in opposition to the conventional idea of what love is. What resembles it is a mother's unconditional love for her child, an analogy the Buddha used often to explain this particular capacity to love others beyond ourselves that exists in all of us. The mother who love her child more than herself, is willing to do anything to take her child's pain onto herself. 

When we breathe out, we send this energy of loving-kindness to that person we are holding in our mind, visualizing it as a shining light that is saturating them, every cell in their body dancing with the radiance of wellbeing, love, peace, and all kinds of goodness.

We take in suffering (compassion) and send out loving-kindness.

As we take in others’ suffering with the in-breath down into the heart, the little pearl that is the self-cherishing mind temporarily dissolves. This happens because it acts as an antidote, in direct opposition to the ego, completely breaking down the hard nugget of "ME! ME! ME FIRST!". In its place arises what Buddhists call “Buddha nature”—our innate capacity for unconditional love, kindness, good will, generosity, and open heartedness. The only thing that blocks this bright diamond from shining forth is the contracting force of the ego, the constant sense of “I” and "My" that dominates the core of our being. When that fades and clears out, even for a very brief moment, this Buddha nature glazes through.

We can all access this basic human capacity that is often in some dormant state and tap into a sincere wish to alleviate suffering from others by being willing to invite it into ourselves. We can start easy with one person that we truly care about, and then expand it gradually to all beings. The key that makes this work is learning to transform suffering without holding on to it and making it our own, a skill we can develop through other forms of meditation that teach us how to observe our own suffering without getting tangled with it, to stay open to it rather than suppress it, and then let it go.

For some, another basic option may be easier. As Pema Chödrön suggests:

“It is true people fear Tonglen practice. Particularly if people have a lot of depression, they fear it is going to be tough to relate with the suffering so directly... I have found that it’s less overwhelming if you start with your own experience of suffering and then generalize to all the other people who are feeling what you do. That gives you a way to work with your pain: instead of feeling like you’re increasing your suffering, you’re making it meaningful. If you’re taught that you should do Tonglen only for other people, that’s too big a leap for most people. But if you start with yourself as the reference point and extend out from that, you find that your compassion becomes much more spontaneous and real. You have less fear of the suffering you perceive in the world—yours and other people’s. It’s a lot about overcoming the fear of suffering.”

You can also follow her guided session of Tonglen HERE.

In summary, taking in and welcoming the pain and suffering of others and then sending out loving-kindness can be a powerful practice, potentially leading toward liberating our own selves from all forms of suffering. However, it has to be done gradually and with some caution, and it should not be a stand-alone practice. Without proper foundation in other formal practices, it can reinforce ego or trigger negative, afflictive emotions. Combined with proper yoga and meditation practices, it can become an extremely valuable complementary piece.

If you're up for it, take five minutes, sit quietly and comfortably on a cushion or a chair, take a few calm breaths and then begin to visualize somebody you know that is suffering in some way, one that you have genuine empathy for, or alternatively yourself, and then start the practice with the in-breath.

If you find yourself curious about these kinds of topics - join a workshop, a retreat, or any other event on offer.

Looking forward to sharing yoga with you!

Wishing everyone peace and happiness,

♡ Oren

Check out the entire Newsletter:

https://preview.mailerlite.io/preview/2057060/emails/184115867273922557