A Gift of Dharma for 12.30.09
by Danny Fisher
Today’s quote is from Buddhist teacher and author Martine Batchelor.
A former Jogye Buddhist nun at South Korea’s Songgwangsa monastery, she was a longtime student of Master Kusan Sunim. From 1981 to 1985, Batchelor even served as his French and English interpreter during his lecture tours in Europe and the United States.
She has since re-entered lay life and is now married to fellow dharma teacher Stephen Batchelor.
In addition to translating Kusan Sunim’s The Way of Zen into English, Batchelor is the author of Meditation for Life, Let Go: A Buddhist Guide to Breaking Free, Principles of Zen: The Only Introduction You’ll Ever Need, Women On The Buddhist Path, The Spirit of the Buddha, The Path of Compassion: The Bodhisattva Precepts, Zen, Walking On Lotus Flowers: Buddhist Women Living, Loving and Meditating, Way of Zen, Buddhism and Ecology (with Kerry Brown), and Women in Korean Zen: Lives and Practices.
Here’s the quote:
In love there is affection, warmth and contact which can have a healing effect. There is a physical, emotional, mental sharing. We come into contact with others. We affect them and they affect us. Love can influence us greatly, it can help us soften what is fixed. It can help us open what is closed. It can be a creative force in our life. In coming close to others we are enriched by their natures and in turn they are enriched by us. Something new can come out of this intimate sharing. In love there is also passion which is full of energy and excitement. This will invigorate us and is often associated with a deep feeling of joy.
Some of the obstacles to love are our agenda, expectations, needs and wants. We have to be careful that in love we are not looking for ourselves, for a replica; nobody can be exactly like us. Love can help us discover our differences so that we can become enriched by them.
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