The Ego Cages Us — The Heart Liberates Us

Source : salaamhearts.com

Spouses need to make sure that the marriage partnership is fulfilling and positive for both husband and wife. A marriage cannot endure if only one partner gets his way or demands that her needs, only, be satisfied. One of the worst disasters in marriage is when one spouse always insists on “being right.” Research shows that this aspect of personality comes from rigidity and weakness rather than strength. Settling differences or making decisions by way of each partner being willing to concede something for the sake of the relationship is a great policy to follow. It’s said that willingness to compromise makes a nation great and marriage happy. Compromise is also an indicator of flexibility and adaptability, two wonderful expressions of love for the spouse and the well-being of the marriage.

Pearl S. Buck, who wrote The Good Earth for which she won the Pulitzer Prize, and later became the first woman to to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1938, said, “A good marriage is one which allows for change and growth in the individuals and in the way they express their love.”

So “being right” and being “right” are not the same. Needing to “be right” is concerned with winning an argument or coming out on top or proving that you are smarter, better, preferred, superior, in control, more sophisticated, more worthy…

Here is no expression of love.

Being “right” is thinking, speaking, and acting according to what is good, just, reasonable, caring, kind, conscientious, honest, respectful, companionable, agreeable, warm-hearted, seeing only the best..

Here are beautiful expressions of love, each another seed planted in the gardens of our souls.

The ego cages us by the need to “be right” all the time. The heart liberates us by being set “right.” How much better would it be if we cared about being compassionate and forgiving rather than “being right”?

Author Sara Paddison said, “You’ll discover that real love is millions of miles past falling in love with anyone or anything. When you make that one effort to feel compassion instead of blame or self-blame, the heart opens again and continues opening.”

A higher potential for enthusiasm about life is found with an open heart. This state of being sees poetry in nature and human dynamics, and the moments in life that convey the tragic side of being human are endured with patience and courage. In this way we come to realize that peace of mind is not some distant state of being to arrive at “if I…” “when I…” “because they…” Peace of mind is a process of letting go, of surrendering impulses that grip the soul with hate or fear, impulse to blame, to resent, get revenge, punish, get even, be right….the list goes on and on.

What stops all that negative miscellany of resisting life and its manifold lessons is not impulse but resolve — the uncompromising decision to see all the imperfections of one’s life and self and others with perfect devotion. Devotion to God, to goodness, to love and compassion…oh, and one more thing — enthusiasm, open-hearted enthusiasm, to forgive again and again. Like immersing the soul in the purifying waterfall of forgiveness.

Once the Prophet was asked, “O Apostle of God!” How many times are we to forgive our servant’s faults?” He was silent. Again the questioner asked, and the Prophet gave no answer. But when the man asked a third time, he said, “Forgive your servant seventy times a day.”

So how many times a day shall we forgive ourselves, our spouses, our children, our parents, our friends?

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Source : salaamhearts.com