How to Love (Mindful Essentials) by Thich Nhat Hanh
Hugging meditation is a practice of mindfulness. “Breathing in, I know my dear one is in my arms, alive. Breathing out, she is so precious to me.” If you breathe deeply like that, holding the person you love, the energy of your care and appreciation will penetrate into that person and she will be nourished and bloom like a flower.
The roots of a lasting relationship are mindfulness, deep listening and loving speech, and a strong community to support you.
When your loved one is talking, practice listening deeply. Sometimes the other person will say something that surprises us, that is the opposite of the way we see things. Allow the other person to speak freely. Don’t cut your loved one off or criticize their words. When we listen deeply with all our heart—for ten minutes, half an hour, or even an hour—we will begin to see the other person more deeply and understand them better. If they say something that’s incorrect, that’s based on a wrong perception, we can give them a little information later on to help them correct their thinking. But right now, we just listen.
Recognizing our habits and smiling to them is the practice of appropriate mental attention, which helps us create new and more beneficial neural pathways.
If you’re too upset to speak calmly, you can write a note and put it where the other person will see it. Here are three sentences that may help. First: “My dear, I am suffering, I am angry, and I want you to know it.” The second is: “I am doing my best.” This means you are practicing mindful breathing and walking, and you are refraining from doing or saying anything out of anger. The third is: “Please help me.”
When our bodies are very close, we feel it will relieve this loneliness. But if we don’t share our aspirations and what’s in our hearts, then even if we live together or have children together, we can still feel very alone.
To love is not to possess the other person or to consume all their attention and love. To love is to offer the other person joy and a balm for their suffering. This capacity is what we have to learn to cultivate.
We cling to objects and to people like a drowning person clings to a floating log. Everything is impermanent. This moment passes. That person walks away. Happiness is still possible.
The sixth mantra is, “You are partly right.” When someone congratulates you or criticizes you, you can use this mantra.
We are aware that blaming and arguing can never help us and only create a wider gap between us; that only understanding, trust, and love can help us change and grow.