So for this week, discussing the different aspects of appreciation, I think appreciation can be a food for people. I think people benefit tremendously from being appreciated. And I would say that a lot of people are not appreciated enough. And something smiles inside something lifts and delights, when there's appreciation. And if the goes a long time without appreciation, especially if we're doing something for others, something begins to sink, something feels a little bit off, and not quite right. We live in a world where there's a mutual, give and take a mutual kind of reference point we use for being with each other. And we might have tremendous generosity and offer things to others. But if not even appreciation or gratitude comes back, then at some point, the feeling generosity begins to become less and less. But if it's a simple appreciation, people understand what we're doing and value it, then it can be a smile, and I'm happy to do it, and maybe easy to do it. So appreciation is a really important ingredient. And appreciation has these different elements to it. And today, I'd like to suggest that important element is respect. And respect is I just let you many of you know, I love the Latin root of the word which means to look again. And when we respect something, we're willing to take a a respectful look again, or we value something enough, we're not afraid of it enough to look again where that can happen. But we respect it we value it enough that it yet this is something that we want to be connected to or to see or to understand. And so, but the respect carries much more respect carries the idea that the person we're with, has value has worth is as granting some someone a certain degree of dignity. And and many people in our society don't feel valued, they feel marginalized, they feel relegated to the edges, and maybe overlooked. And so to have no one overlooked, to have everyone worthy of being seen, again, being seen clearly, and appreciated and valued. And maybe even more than valued, to be delighted in and to be grateful for. Even if people don't do anything for us. The gratitude can simply be we're grateful to be delighted and another human being are grateful to the chance to be connected or to see. And all these ideas might seem like we don't have time for it, or they might seem a little bit superficial or, or you know, there's important things to do. So we can't stop and look again and grant people's dignity and value, maybe. But a source I'd like to propose the source of respecting others is to respect oneself. And to respect oneself is to value oneself and value self not because of what we're going to accomplish. And so we have to do a lot, but value something here that's present value ourselves in this present moment manifestation. And this is very important, because the future self may not exist at all, we don't know how long are we going to be alive, the future self might be very different than who you are today. Any future self ideas you have is just a prediction of fantasy and imagination. It might be a reasonable prediction. But we don't know. The past is receded into memory receded into maybe the residue of past experience in us. But the past itself is just a kind of a virtual reality of sorts. And, and memory of the past is not always accurate. The maybe, maybe frequently is inaccurate and sometimes it gets more accurate over time when certain selection process and a certain kind of storytelling begins to shift and change. And so the present moment is something very different than the past in the future. Very Different than fantasy, it's the only place where our lived experience can be the only place that our lived, humanity can manifest and be. This is a very important time and place to really experience life, because everything else in life is not quite life, it's kind of virtual or something the past in the future, but here, and so to respect what's here to value this, these moments of consciousness, the value of this, the heartbeat, a beating, and his chance to experience and be in this life, and to value our well being and to respect their autonomy and our dignity and our efforts to try to make make our way through this difficult life. So to respect ourselves, is maybe not always easy. But the more we have the self respect, then the more respecting others carries value, and that carries strength in it. If we diminish our value, and kind of half heartedly, err on the sly, or on the side, or offer respect to others offer generosity to others, it could be wonderful. But it's not received, maybe as fully as it would be if a person shows up completely there. And there's a fullness because we respect ourselves, there's a fullness of embodiment, here I am, and this person here, all of this person here is present for you for a few moments, with respect with care with appreciation. So, and that, that carries a lot more strength, maybe power more, more value for the person. And that we offer respect to, we offer appreciation. And so offering or having respect for oneself is not, you know, doesn't have to be an overly self focused phenomenon. It's a, it's, it's a important phenomena, Fortin way of being that allows us to convey and care and respect and love for others, in a greater way. And it's almost as if you want to love others, if you want to care for others, begin by respecting yourself. And with that, comes a tremendous amount of healthy care for others. A lack of respect for others can simply also be not because we disrespect ourselves. But because we don't think we're have time to take care of ourselves. We don't have time to eat and sleep and exercise and maybe meditate so that the best of us has a chance to come and meet the other people. So respect is an important element of appreciation. And, and this is certainly the minimum that is to really see that it's appropriate to bring our attention to really see and understand who's there. But it also involves seeing people as valuable as important. Some people might say precious, some people might say that others are treasures. But so not not just a lover, not just a family member, do we kind of offer our wonderful love and appreciation and delight. But we can do it in an appropriate way, even for strangers and for people who are difficult in our lives. Sometimes offering respect to people who are difficult appreciation to people finding ways to appreciate them, finding ways to respect them, is the ingredient for how to overcome some of the conflicts we can be in. So respect as a foundation, one of the foundational elements for being able to offer compassion in full and effective way. If we offer compassion without respect, then we're in trouble. I think people can feel that and and maybe then the compassion sometimes might not even be accepted because the people don't feel somehow that they're recognized in any important way. So for some of us may be the concept of respect as an ongoing orientation. might not be familiar might not be something we do. But at least for this day.
May be You can do a meet again, maybe you can carry with you the notion of respect. And to see how you how that lives in you, do you have respect for yourself? Do you have respect for others? If you weren't going to respect the people you're with? What form would it take? that's appropriate for you? How do you embody respect? How does that, that the movement or respect move through you in your own way, because for different people, that may be different things would be considered respect. And so for you, what's a clean, healthy form of respect for yourself for others, and what happens when you begin embodying that in your relationship to other people, and I use the word embodiment, intentionally as a kind of wholeheartedness a whole bardenas A whole wholeness a whole, you know, really bringing ourselves into it in a more full way than maybe usual. So it's the intentional and purposeful and, and really, really has kind of a center stage for what we how we go about. So thank you, and I value very much that you're listening to this and maybe practicing with these things, and I have a chance to teach them and thank you and I look forward to continuing tomorrow.
