I find myself wanting desperately to be “in love” or “in a relationship” that I am supposed to be non-attached to (regardless of the other party). I want to be part of something that’s filled with love, built on love, exudes love, and just is. But daily life and humbling leads to frustration when I don’t get what I want, when things go wrong, when someone hurts my feelings. And then I have forgotten. So this is the meditation I remind myself with (or at least try to). I usually stand in front of a mirror and read them aloud, but seeing as where I live now there is no mirror anywhere fairly private, I usually sit on my bed in the lotus position or go outside on my roof and sit and read them aloud. Sometimes I have to read them ten time before they sink in…again.

May I consider all beings precious.

May I always respect others as superior while attaining self-esteem.

May I face my inner darkness and turn it to good.

May I be moved with compassion for the pain behind the spite others may show me.

When I am hurt by others, may I forego retaliation while always fighting injustice.

May I reckon those who betray me as sacred teachers.

May I offer joy to all beings and secretly take on their suffering.

May all beings and I be free from ego concerns of loss and gain.

so here i am reminding myself, about suffering, about why we suffer, and why it’s silly of me to continue to suffer. i need to let go fully. i am challenging myself, my own will-power to release the attachment - to practise non-attachment with another human being.

i’d felt i’d done so well at detaching from worldy goods, i lost almost everything i owned in a divorce, i’d never really had anything before that as i grew up in s8 housing and then one day i fell in love with a truly emotionally unavailable man and then…BLAM!

someone blindsided me. i was attached. i was probably more than attached. i called him Daddy. he called me his baby girl slave angel. i wore a rhinestoned dog tag that said “PROPERTY OF HALCYON”. but then that all ended abruptly, i relocated and now - over 3 months later, i’m finally ready to deal with the fact that i haven’t been true to myself, my ideals, My Path in these past few months … and dare i say in the few months before that even?

The First of Four Noble Truths - Dukkha: this is the noble truth of suffering:

The Buddha said “…birth is suffering, aging is suffering, illness is suffering, death is suffering; union with what is displeasing is suffering; separation from what is pleasing is suffering; not to get what one wants is suffering; in brief, the five aggregates subject to clinging are suffering.”
this is only the first of the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism. but i figured one would be enough for me to try to sit with for the night.
a “person” is made up of the five aggregates, beyond which there is no “self”. suffering arises when one identifies with or otherwise clings to an aggregate; hence, suffering is extinguished by relinquishing attachment to aggregates.

here are the 5 “aggregates” or skandhas or khandas, depending on your flavour of buddhism and/or where you come from:

1. “form” or “matter” (sa., pi. rūpa):
   includes both external and internal matter. Externally, rupa is the physical world. Internally, rupa includes the material body and the physical sense organs.
2. “sensation” or “feeling” (sa., pi. vedanā):
   sensing pleasant, unpleasant or neutral (neither-pleasant-nor-unpleasant). Generally considered not to include “emotions.”
3. “perception” or “cognition” (sa. samjñā, pi. saññā):
   registers whether sense data is recognized or not (for instance, the sound of a bell or the shape of a tree). From samyutta-ñana, conditioned knowledge. It is ordinarily conditioned by ones past sankhara, and therefore conveys a coloured image of reality.
4. “mental formations” or “volition” (sankhāra) :
   all types of mental habits, thoughts, ideas, opinions, compulsions, and decisions. Sankhāra arise from contact with form or from other mental factors. Sankhāra are the source of karma.
5. “consciousness” (sa. vijñāna, pi. viññāṇa):
   conscious base that support all experience.

*** these 5 aggregates have been brought to you by wikipedia.org, which we all know rocks. so go be good to them. thanks! i have a lot to think about, it may be awhile before i have a response to my own challenge to my Self.