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767th Week: Practicing Mutual Empowerment
Listening to a cooking show on NPR this morning, there was an interview with a man who has a restaurant in Houston, TX called Underbelly Hospitality. I didn’t hear the very beginning of the interview, but the gist was that the owner/chef has a great interest in foods of every kind, from many different countries, and has spent a great deal of time with other chefs/restauranteurs in the area getting to know the in’s and out’s of their particular kinds of food, including Vietnamese and others. What struck me most powerfully is that he is a man who practices what I call “mutual empowerment”. At his restaurant, there was a time when the check for meals was accompanied by a list of other restaurants in the area where people could go, inviting them to explore how these foods tasted in various places. His goal was, and is, to share all the wonderful resources in his city and to cultivate his close relationships with other chefs in the city.
I’ve written before about the power dynamics of “power-over” and those of “mutual empowerment.” In the “power-over” model, there are only two positions: who’s on top and who’s on the bottom, who has power and who is over-powered. We see this kind of power relationship in many countries in the world right now, including the United States. In the “power-over” model, only a relatively few people are granted the privilege to have power over a vast majority of people. Many are left out…
Read More “767th Week: Practicing Mutual Empowerment”Week 646: Compassion and Empathy
Listening to a report on poverty on NPR this morning got me to thinking more deeply about the difference between compassion and empathy. The report included research on the impact of compassion and empathy in the presence of suffering. Read More “Week 646: Compassion and Empathy”

859th Week: Each Small Act Matters
I’ve mentioned a number of times that I post a daily inspirational quote and photograph of our beautiful earth in two places. One is the Devadana Sanctuary Facebook page and the other is on the Devadana Sanctuary side of my Portal to Multidimensional Living. I’ve done this for a number of years now, as the process of choosing the quotation and photograph each day has become a form of meditation for me.
Two recent quotes, one I posted through Devadana Sanctuary, the other posted by someone else on Facebook, touched into a practice that I engage in daily and I wanted to share it with you at this time of the ending of one year, one cycle, and the beginning of the new. First, here are two quotations that touch on what I want to share in this weekly practice:
“I do not think that it is naïve to think that it is the tiny, particular acts of love and joy which are going to swing the balance.” ~ Madeleine L’Engle, A Circle of Quiet
“We live at a time when the greatest form of courage is to act as if our lives made a difference.”
~ William Sullivan, The Secret of the Inca

810th Week: Cultivating A Sense of Connection
As we collectively continue to be met with powerful challenges of loss, grief, change, and concerns about the future, having practices available that allow us to ground ourselves, re-center ourselves, and orient to a more heart-centered perception and awareness is more important than ever. One of the practices that I have found comforting during difficult times is to remember that I am part of a much larger context of connection and to orient my awareness toward ways of experiencing that sense of connection.
For this week’s practice, I’d like to share one of the approaches that helps me feel more grounded during times of distress and uncertainty. It relates to something I say all the time, which is, “We’re not in this alone.” As much as we may feel disconnected at times, from an energy perspective, and from the perspective of collective consciousness, it’s impossible for us to be truly alone, impossible not to be connected to our larger collective presence, comprised of each of us and of all our earth-kin.
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