"the gentle art of blessing"

for the last couple months, i've been reading the gentle art of blessing by pierre prandervand.  a little excerpt from the book can give you a taste of what this book is about, or you could click the title of the book above, order, and check it out yourself.

pradervand enthusiastically shares the journey of his discovery and practice of blessing as an everyday art.  as his ideas have begun to sink into my own mind and way of being, i've realized how fantastic blessing is as a tool to transform what would otherwise be painful and conflicted interactions.

when i first started reading the book, life presented me with an opportunity for blessing.  a student came into my office one day and informed me that he'd gone to the administration to complain about me.  as he told me about my unfairness in grading, my adrenaline started to pump, and the knee jerk reaction to defend myself and point out his deficencies started moving towards action.

luckily, i recognized this as an opportunity to put my passion for peace into practice, and i stopped myself.  instead of picking up my own sword and fighting back, i could choose to bless him.  i could see his integrity, his goodness, his desire to connect and succeed.  i could see his blame as merely one small part of all he was bringing into my office, and i could honor and recognize how much more there was to him and to what he was saying.

as i resisted my initial conditioned response, i sat quietly and worked to hold a loving space.  i detected a little surprise from him that i was so calm, and the entire encounter was over as quickly as it began.  i'd be lying if i said it didn't cause me some anxiousness, but overall, the discomfort on my end was considerably less than during tense student situations in the past.

the real testament to the power of this practice came as the semester continued.  i was astounded at how the behavior of this student shifted.  prior to that meeting, my impression of him was that he was somewhat of a slacker, rather disengaged, and unreceptive to learning the skills i teach.  after the meeting, i noticed that he engaged differently in class, and even more surprising, he regularly and humbly started coming to my office with questions and taking the necessary initiative to bring his own skills to the next level.

these subsequent visits to my office could've been awkward, even adversarial, but they weren't.  they were pleasant, and as a teacher, i felt fulfilled and even inspired by how this student had shifted.  i had a chance to witness how much more he really was than what he showed earlier in the semester, or what he showed in my office that one day.

and even more, i had a chance to learn from and reflect on what caused his discontent.  by avoiding the temptation to defend myself, i had the opportunity to see where i could grow as a teacher.  i could see that he was teaching me, just as i was teaching him.  as he demonstrated how to walk deeper into his role as a student, i felt filled with ideas and inspiration for how i could walk deeper into my role as a teacher.

the book is filled with stories much more powerful and profound than this little episode from my own life.  the power of blessing is truly transformative, and to me, it feels like the mental action of living in rumi's field.  to live in a state of blessing is to live beyond rightdoing and wrongdoing, in a place where everything is just as it should be, and all that exists is really beautiful, complete, and fully capable of amazing feats.