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Archive for April 13, 2021

Left Behind: Surviving Suicide Loss

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DailyGood News That Inspires

April 13, 2021

a project of ServiceSpace

Left Behind: Surviving Suicide Loss

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding

– Kahlil Gibran –

Left Behind: Surviving Suicide Loss

In the spring of 2017, Nandini Murali, a South Indian journalist and author, returned from an out-of-town assignment to an eerily quiet home. Typically, her husband would greet her at the front door, but that morning he hadn’t answered her phone calls. It was Nandini who discovered his body, and confronted an unfathomable reality. T.R. Murali, one of the most prominent urologists in India, and her beloved husband of 33 years, had ended his own life. “Space dissolved,” writes Nandini, of that moment. “Time stood still. The axis of my life heaved, cracked and split.” On the first anniversary of her husband’s death, Nandini launched SPEAK (Suicide Prevention Postvention Education Awareness Knowledge). SPEAK seeks to cultivate awareness instead of stigma, and to break the taboos, shame, and secrecy around suicide through public campaigns and sensitization. Through SPEAK, Nandini has mobilized social support for prevention, intervention, and postvention efforts in India and beyond.In the course of these efforts, her searing personal grief has shape-shifted into deeply activated compassion and powerful clarity of purpose.Read an excerpt from her new book, “Left Behind: Surviving Suicide Loss.” { read more }

Be The Change

Join this Saturday’s Awakin Call with Nandini Murali, “Owning Our Stories: Breaking the Silence Around Suicide to Heal Self & Society.” More details and RSVP info here. { more }

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Awakin Weekly: Radical Reflection

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Radical Reflection
by Kittisaro

[Listen to Audio!]

2460.jpgWe feel we can capture something by thinking about it. In reality, when we grasp at thoughts, the very process of trying to possess a piece of life ensures that it continually eludes us. We can never hold on, so the thoughts go round and round.

The transformative power of a conscious, mindful thought is that it reveals its own transiency. For example, the thought “Who is thinking?” is an invitation to make contact with the present moment. In doing so, the thinking process is recognized for what it is. When we’re not so enchanted by our thoughts, we notice something else, something quite simple. We notice that all thoughts manifest and dissolve back into silent listening. This is a great relief. We don’t have to become shaped by our thinking. We can be liberated from its bondage. In seeing thought as “just thought,” the sky of the heart is revealed, with no footprints. “You won’t find the sage out there.” When there is wisdom, the endless searching for happiness “somewhere else” vanishes. Where is there to go? Beautiful thoughts and ugly thoughts, all arise and cease in awareness, and yet awareness remains unmoved.

Awakening means a fundamental shift takes place. It is a shift from looking for ourselves outside in the ten thousand things to recognizing that our true nature is beyond definition. That transformation of understanding is the work of wisdom, the essential quality of heart that carries us across the turbulent sea of suffering to safety and ease. The Buddha refers to this liberating activity as Yoniso manasikara. It is often translated as “wisely reflecting.” Yoni means “womb” and manas refers to the mind. Taken as a whole we can interpret the phrase as “placing the mind and its activities in the womb of awareness.” Wise reflection does not stop at the superficial cognition of the world, but it plumbs the depths of awareness, exploring the unmoving ground of “knowing” within which all the apparent differences of life manifest. I like the English translation “radical reflection” for this significant term, since it echoes the “re-membering” of all phenomena to its source, the matrix of awareness that makes all experience possible.

The word radical has its etymological connection to root. Radical reflection contemplates the root, the origin, the place where all things merge.

About the Author: Kittisaro is a former monk and the founder of a hermitage in South Africa. Excerpt above from the article, Tangled in Thought.

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Radical Reflection
What does ‘radical reflection’ mean to you? Can you share an experience of a time you were able to connect with the unmoving ground of ‘knowing’ within which all apparent differences of life manifest? What helps you place your mind and its activities in the womb of awareness?
Jagdish P Dave wrote: Radical reflection means to be aware of the root cause of suffering with an open mind and open heart. Awareness clears my visionclouded by my ignorance of who or what I am; how my clear seeing is affe…
David Doane wrote: It is said when you stop chasing the butterfly it comes and lands gently on your shoulder. As Kittasaropoints out, the word radical means root. Radical reflection means root reflection. Root reflectio…
me wrote: Amen David. There is more to this life and world than we can see. So much more (thanks be to God) … if we only stop chasing. Yes, to your reflection!…
Share/Read Your Reflections
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Back in 1997, one person started sending this simple “meditation reminder” to a few friends. Soon after, “Wednesdays” started, ServiceSpace blossomed, and the humble experiments of service took a life of its own. If you’d like to start an Awakin gathering in your area, we’d be happy to help you get started.

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Left Behind: Surviving Suicide Loss

You’re receiving this email because you are a DailyGood subscriber.
Trouble Viewing? On a mobile? Just click here. Not interested anymore? Unsubscribe.
DailyGood News That Inspires

April 13, 2021

a project of ServiceSpace

Left Behind: Surviving Suicide Loss

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding

– Kahlil Gibran –

Left Behind: Surviving Suicide Loss

In the spring of 2017, Nandini Murali, a South Indian journalist and author, returned from an out-of-town assignment to an eerily quiet home. Typically, her husband would greet her at the front door, but that morning he hadn’t answered her phone calls. It was Nandini who discovered his body, and confronted an unfathomable reality. T.R. Murali, one of the most prominent urologists in India, and her beloved husband of 33 years, had ended his own life. “Space dissolved,” writes Nandini, of that moment. “Time stood still. The axis of my life heaved, cracked and split.” On the first anniversary of her husband’s death, Nandini launched SPEAK (Suicide Prevention Postvention Education Awareness Knowledge). SPEAK seeks to cultivate awareness instead of stigma, and to break the taboos, shame, and secrecy around suicide through public campaigns and sensitization. Through SPEAK, Nandini has mobilized social support for prevention, intervention, and postvention efforts in India and beyond.In the course of these efforts, her searing personal grief has shape-shifted into deeply activated compassion and powerful clarity of purpose.Read an excerpt from her new book, “Left Behind: Surviving Suicide Loss.” { read more }

Be The Change

Join this Saturday’s Awakin Call with Nandini Murali, “Owning Our Stories: Breaking the Silence Around Suicide to Heal Self & Society.” More details and RSVP info here. { more }

COMMENT | RATE Email Twitter FaceBook

Related Good News

Smile Big
Love Freely
Meditate
Give Back

111 Trees

Being Resilient During Coronavirus

Translating Meaning Into Life: A Taoist Parable

I Wish My Teacher Knew…

Smile Big
Love Freely
Meditate
Give Back

Why Singing in a Choir Makes You Happier

The Monkey and the River

The Understory: Life Beneath the Forest Floor

Beyond Overwhelm into Refuge

DailyGood is a volunteer-run initiative that delivers “good news” to 245,060 subscribers. There are many ways to help. To unsubscribe, click here.

Other ServiceSpace projects include:

KindSpring // KarmaTube // Conversations // Awakin // More

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