This Is What Compassion Looks Like: A Buddhist View of Occupy Wall Street (HuffPo)

[OneGrassRoot]

The people on the streets in New York are in the process of being the change they wish to see, to use Gandhi's phrase. They have organized to provide health care for each other, to feed each other, to clean up their space together, to deal with difficult situations using creative solutions. They have intentionally refused alignment with any political party in order to keep their message open to the widest audience. They are taking pains to use a collective decision-making process so that the voices of the marginalized are being heard and considered.

In the context of Buddhist teachings and practice, these are all compassionate actions.

It calls to mind the words that Indian author and activist Arundhati Roy spoke at the 2003 World Social Forum:

"Our strategy should be not only to confront empire, but to lay siege to it. To deprive it of oxygen. To shame it. To mock it. With our art, our music, our literature, our stubbornness, our joy, our brilliance, our sheer relentlessness -- and our ability to tell our own stories. Stories that are different from the ones we're being brainwashed to believe. The corporate revolution will collapse if we refuse to buy what they are selling -- their ideas, their version of history, their wars, their weapons, their notion of inevitability.The people on the streets in New York are in the process of being the change they wish to see, to use Gandhi's phrase. They have organized to provide health care for each other, to feed each other, to clean up their space together, to deal with difficult situations using creative solutions. They have intentionally refused alignment with any political party in order to keep their message open to the widest audience. They are taking pains to use a collective decision-making process so that the voices of the marginalized are being heard and considered."

Full article here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/roshi-joan-halifax/buddhism-and-occupy-wall-street_b_1010228.html

:)

[Mnemosyne]

1. Occupying the Present Moment

Thank you, more need to think like the Buddhists and sweethearts like those here at ASHA! :grouphug::hi::loveya:

http://bpf.org/occupying-the-present-moment

Interconnection.  We are moved by the interconnectedness expressed in this movement.  Occupy Wall Street is not about one environmental situation or one war, but rather about all of the systems which create suffering for all beings, and which are all related to each other.  Our spiritual practice is not just for our individual enlightenment, but to end suffering for all beings, so we are moved to address this system.

Ending suffering means changing the conditions of inequality. The influence of money, corporations, and banks in our U.S. political system blocks all of the human and environmental goals that BPF works towards.  Numerous Buddhist texts point out that if an individual lives in poverty it is not due to karma as a form of personal punishment, but rather that poverty exists within a web of collective causes and conditions. The Buddha also noted that the way to build a peaceful society is to ensure equitable distribution of resources.  Many U.S. Buddhists believe in the importance of cultivating a limitless heart that embraces the goal of a society in which everyone has their basic needs met, plus education, a living wage, and the opportunity to care for their families and to develop spiritually.

The means are the ends.  We are moved by and in agreement with the nonviolent tactics of the movement.  We believe in the power of compassionate presence, of bearing witness, and of nonviolent strategies toward spiritual awakening and liberation. The people on the streets in New York, and around the country and world, are in the process of being the change they wish to see, to use Gandhi’s phrase.

We participate in solidarity with the 100%—with all beings.  While we want to change the situation of disparity in world, we don’t want to exile the 1% from our hearts.  Furthermore, we are aware that lumping people together, whether into the 99% or the 100%, can invisibilize people's experiences, especially those of people of color, and the many others who bear the heaviest burdens of inequality in the U.S. and in the world.  While we are all interconnected, we are not all the same.  With this recognition of diversity, we stand in solidarity with the 100%.

[OneGrassRoot]

2. Most awesome!

:hug:

:hi:

[Mnemosyne]

4. It was posted on old friend's FB wall, she married a Buddhist. Her son is dying, 33yo.

I hope she finds peace. She is a Type A personality, was surprised when she married a Buddhist! He is an awesome man and will help her through.

[OneGrassRoot]

6. Oh my goodness...

I hope she finds peace, too.

:hug:

[Mnemosyne]

7. She's a tough cookie, but he is her only child, making it even tougher.

I've known him since he was a kid doing Beavis and Butthead imitations, over and over and over...

They thought he was in the clear for a couple of years, then cancer returned more virulent than before and a rare type. It's so sad when kids go first. :cry:

I know his spirit will go on in the One and hope she understands and finds comfort and peace in it.

:hug:

[Blue_Tires]

3. thanks for this

[Mnemosyne]

5. Very welcome! n/t