In any given moment we have a choice available to us - there is a higher value or a lower value. We can choose to live from the higher value or to engage in the lower value, which is often the knee-jerk, habitual response we are used to.

It can seem easier to choose the lower value, or to not resist engaging in the lower value. Sometimes we may even get a little satisfaction from it - from being mean to someone who has hurt us (a sense of 'getting them back'), from cutting someone else off from some experience because we feel envious of them in some way, for responding with a smart or sarcastic quip, or to get 'one up' on someone who's said or done something hurtful to us, or more accurately, has triggered some existing hurt we have inside. Or perhaps it's as simple as seeing a mess but leaving it and pretending we haven't seen it in the hopes someone else will deal with it. We've all done it.

But the truth is, that though it may seem easier, it's actually just more habitual. The fallout from these actions is not easier - it's more painful: we cut ourselves off from the flow of love and connection which comes from empathy and compassion. We close off the path to becoming closer by seeing the deeper truth of what's occurring - two people who have both been hurt are acting from the place of that hurt. The guilt we feel at saying something we wish we hadn't said in the heat of the moment, or for doing something we knew was wrong, or the frustration that we didn't do what we knew in the moment to be the right thing to do.

Meditation gives us the space and increased awareness to be able to pause, and detect what that higher value is, and then to have the strength to go against conditioning and habit, and to favour the higher value. See to what extent you can detect the higher value and take action in that direction, and what the outcomes are for you.

Much love and Jai Guru Deva*

Georgia

*victory of light over darkness/ignorance