{"id":10716,"date":"2015-08-04T16:45:33","date_gmt":"2015-08-04T20:45:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/?p=10716"},"modified":"2015-08-04T16:45:33","modified_gmt":"2015-08-04T20:45:33","slug":"when-people-you-love-hurt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html","title":{"rendered":"when people you love hurt"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"via<\/a>
via google<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I have never known what to do when people I love hurt. Whether it’s physical, mental, or spiritual, all I know how to do is hug, soothe, and cook. I prescribe what works for me: flowers, tea, chocolate. Cookies. Time spent watching birds.<\/p>\n

It meets w\/ spotty success, I confess.<\/p>\n

And of course, as any Buddhist wannabe, I practice\u00a0tonglen<\/u><\/span>. <\/i>I practice as my beloved Pema Chodron teaches: when my husband is suffering from his incessantly difficult knees, I remember how my own hands ache from arthritis, and how my own knees give out in the stiffness of early morning. I identify with his pain, breathe it in, and then breathe out peace. Comfort.<\/p>\n

I also make a nice pot of tea, and buy salted dark chocolate caramels. Not as good for my karmic profile, I know, but sooo tasty!<\/p>\n

When my young girlfriend speaks of her few difficulties w\/ her new baby, I think of when I wake up mid-sleep and can’t relax, over-thinking my life. I breathe in her anxiety\u00a0— worried as she may be\u00a0that she won’t be able to handle this new, infinitely complex\u00a0job — and breathe out comfort. I also pick up Starbuck’s, in case she needs some added energy. \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

\"via<\/a>
via google<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Tonglen<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>may be what best defines Buddhism to me: the desire to make the world better on a person-by-person, every day to every day, basis. And then\u00a0practicing<\/em> that desire: breathing in pain, breathing out comfort. As one source notes, it begins with befriending ourselves: noting our own pain, our own grief & loss & fear, and sitting with it for a moment. Then realising — on a bone-deep visceral level — that\u00a0ALL\u00a0<\/em>human beings feel pain, grief, loss & fear. That alone is pretty amazing stuff.<\/p>\n

But to move from that recognition to the desire to change this, to use our own dark places to heal those of others? How incredibly wonderful is that impulse?<\/p>\n

Today, if you’re blue, or wondering how to help someone you love weather a difficult time? Don’t think. Just breathe. In< pain\/ out> comfort. It’s really that simple.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I have never known what to do when people I love hurt. Whether it’s physical, mental, or spiritual, all I know how to do is hug, soothe, and cook. I prescribe what works for me: flowers, tea, chocolate. Cookies. Time spent watching birds. It meets w\/ spotty success, I confess. And of course, as any…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":398,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1027,15,30,309,157],"tags":[11,1181,1187,262,1185,1193,1259,1225],"class_list":["post-10716","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chocolate","category-compassion","category-grieving","category-pema-chodron","category-tonglen","tag-beginners-heart","tag-britton-gildersleeve","tag-buddhism","tag-buddhist-blogs","tag-compassion","tag-grieving","tag-pema-chodron","tag-tonglen"],"yoast_head":"\nwhen people you love hurt - Beginner's Heart<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I have never known what to do when people I love hurt. Whether it's physical, mental, or spiritual, all I know how to do is hug, soothe, and cook. I\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"when people you love hurt - Beginner's Heart\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I have never known what to do when people I love hurt. Whether it's physical, mental, or spiritual, all I know how to do is hug, soothe, and cook. I\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beginner's Heart\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-08-04T20:45:33+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/files\/2015\/08\/heartbreak-252x300.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Britton Gildersleeve\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"when people you love hurt - Beginner's Heart","description":"I have never known what to do when people I love hurt. Whether it's physical, mental, or spiritual, all I know how to do is hug, soothe, and cook. I","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"when people you love hurt - Beginner's Heart","og_description":"I have never known what to do when people I love hurt. Whether it's physical, mental, or spiritual, all I know how to do is hug, soothe, and cook. I","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html","og_site_name":"Beginner's Heart","article_published_time":"2015-08-04T20:45:33+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/files\/2015\/08\/heartbreak-252x300.jpg"}],"author":"Britton Gildersleeve","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html","name":"when people you love hurt - Beginner's Heart","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/files\/2015\/08\/heartbreak-252x300.jpg","datePublished":"2015-08-04T20:45:33+00:00","dateModified":"2015-08-04T20:45:33+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/#\/schema\/person\/b4348bfbe2223c0ec325db830aa95f52"},"description":"I have never known what to do when people I love hurt. Whether it's physical, mental, or spiritual, all I know how to do is hug, soothe, and cook. I","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/files\/2015\/08\/heartbreak-252x300.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/files\/2015\/08\/heartbreak-252x300.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/2015\/08\/when-people-you-love-hurt.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"when people you love hurt"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/","name":"Beginner's Heart","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Britton Gildersleeve","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/#\/schema\/person\/b4348bfbe2223c0ec325db830aa95f52","name":"Britton Gildersleeve","description":"Britton Gildersleeve is a 'third culture kid.' Years spent living on the margins - in places with exotic names and food shortages - have left her with a visceral response to folks \u2018without,\u2019 as well as a desire to live her Buddhism in an engaged fashion. She\u2019s a writer and a teacher, the former director of a federal non-profit for teachers who write. She believes that if we talk to each other, we can learn to love each other (but she's still learning how). And she believes in tea. She is (still) working on her beginner's heart ~","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/author\/brittongildersleeve"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/398"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10716"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10716\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10720,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10716\/revisions\/10720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beginnersheart\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}