ma ta la shol (mah tah lah shohl) Mayan

How is your heart?

Being fully present with another is a profound experience. Normally when we exchange brief social amenities, our eyes meet momentarily, we offer a few words, then our energy drifts elsewhere, along with the deepest parts of ourselves. These casual contacts take on a different tenor when our initial greeting invites a transformative response. Rather than “How’s it going?”, or “Hello” or “What’s Up?” we might try “Blessings on you, friend. Are you awake to the glory of this moment?” or perhaps “There is a special reason we are sharing this moment. Let us discover it!” The Mayan ma ta la shol will certainly generate some interesting responses. With such an opening, we acknowledge the seat of the soul, and the source of well-being. Hearts nurture love as the earth nourishes corn - a crop sacred to the Maya - hence greeting another with this form of social embrace, we gently clear the way to a seedbed of affectionate support. We then join in a special bond of meaningful, generative exchange.

With each being I meet I acknowledge that it is safe to let my heart lead my mind.

jam karet (jahm Kah reht) Bahasa Indonesia

Rubber time.

If we could bottle time, or package it like a nutritional supplement, the demand for it would be overwhelming. We are a time-conscious society, juggling commitments against the ruthless flash of a digital monster. Is it time to go, eat, sleep, work, make love? Bowing before the clockmaker god we’ve become swept up in a superphysiologic pace, a hurry sickness that is destructive. What’s more, time is constantly perceived in terms of not enough. Enter jam karet! Consciously, if only for a brief interlude, let time be stretched to accommodate the natural rhythms of your day. Expand the window you usually allow for an activity. Perhaps invite lunch to evolve into an all-afternoon affair. Or permit a visit with friends to take as long as it needs to go on until you feel complete. Give yourself the gift of an unstructured day. The purpose of singing, or dancing, or living itself, is not to get to the end of the “piece”, so that we can move on to something else, but rather to be suspended in the moment, to experience the joy of timelessness.

Today I will live as if time were a blank canvas, rather than a prison wall.

uffda (OOF-dah) Swedish

A word of sympathy used when someone else is struggling in pain.

There is pain and struggle in being human. Because we have loved, grief walks by our side. Relationships, physical breakdowns, and deep disappointments all lead to pain. We even create agony by doing what is expected rather than following inner guidance; to the extent that our inner and outer lives are incongruent, we may experience hopeless helpless futility and loss of the authentic self. Life sometimes seems a tragedy in endless acts. Pain, however, is stuck energy and once shared, can begin to dissipate. When we utter uffda to people, we simultaneously acknowledge their pain, and express sympathy, joining them in their suffering, if only for a moment. Grieving has its own rhythms, and often demands sharing. It is an occasion for healthy dependency, for not “going it alone”. In fact, the “I want to get it over with” mindset is ultimately self-defeating. When we are there for another, despite the confusion and devastation, we become more of who we are.

In being present with another’s pain, I expand my capacity for compassion.

Victor La Cuerva, M.D.

formerly of: New Mexico Department of Health

Author of Worldwords and Pathway to Peace

(To order either title call 800-322-4233)

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Mariposa Men’s Wellness Institute was founded in 2001

to help men become emotionally healthy.