New Monthly 'Metta Circle' Begins...

This evening we held our first 'Metta Circle', a monthly training in the ancient Buddhist practice of developing universal love for all beings. On the third Thursday of each month we'll have a short teaching on "metta" (love/kindness), a period of metta meditation, and a 'council circle' on the theme of love. We'll also sing together an old Buddhist chant "Sabbe Satta Sukhi Hontu" which means "May All Beings Be Well And Happy".

Keeping in mind that we're not simply a Buddhist group, though we use "Buddhist" practices, we dedicated this new circle to the memory of the late Shaikh Muzaffer Ozak of the Helveti Jerrahi Sufi tradition from Istanbul. He's a great teacher in one of the lineages we're born from, and was himself a particularly wonderful example of creating a community of love and appreciation for one another. He was also a lover of the "Divine Feminine" (for want of better words), as was his student the late Lex Hixon who also inspires our Great Heart Society.

We appproached Metta practice as the song of the Divine Mother who loves all her children, the Divine Feminine in all of us which is there waiting to be discovered and expressed in our lives.

Second Annual Burns Night, and New Ceremony!

This evening in our monthly Great Heart Circle we celebrated the poetry and spirit of Robert Burns, reading and singing together some of his most famous works- A Red Red Rose, Westlin' Winds, A Man's A Man and the Gowden Locks of Anna. We talked about Burns' detailed appreciation of nature, how he knew the names and lives of so many creatures, and how in our modern lives we lose so much of that, by not seeing the world around us as richly as we could.

At the end of the Zen meditation session, we held a small new ceremony. Our group has no membership, anyone coming along is as much a part of it as anyone else. So to find a way to celebrate our connectedness, we'll be giving a small ceremonial gift to anyone who's been coming along regularly for a year or more. This doesn't make them more of a member, it's just a way of appreciating the connection they've made with us all. For this first ceremony, where there were seven people who've been coming along at least a year, we each received a handmade coloured Indian scroll with a line from a Zen poem written on it.

Next month will mark 2 years of us meeting in the Unitarian Chapel in Leicester, and on the third Thursday of this month we'll be starting a second circle, in someone's house, to work with the Buddhist meditation practice of developing universal Love, called "Metta" in the old language of Pali - the wish for all beings to be well, happy and that their heart's wish be fulfilled.

So let us pray that come it may,
As come it will for a' that,
That sense and worth o'er all the earth
May bear the gree and a' that.
For a' that and a' that,
It's coming yet for a' that,
That man to man, the world o'er
Shall brothers be, for a' that.

Robert Burns

In Memory of Julian Sirkar Grindon-Welch, 1927-2005

I've noticed that there is no mention at all on the whole internet of Julian Grindon-Welch, a Sufi teacher who had a huge influence on me and the shaping of our Great Heart Society, apart from a brief obituary from the Telegraph in 2005. So I thought I'd write something here so his name will be remembered more widely.

I was introduced to Julian in 1997 through the International Sufi Movement, in which he was a Khalif and authorised initiator, and coordinator for the UK. We corresponded with each other by letter every two weeks for about a year, when I moved back up to Scotland and sadly lost touch with him, other than exchanging occasional emails. The last time I heard from him was less than a month before he died in 2005.

In Summer 1998 I visited Julian and his wife Evelyn in their beautiful historic house in Cornwall, I remember the train journey down there very well, blue skies and shining sun, spectacular views of the sea, the first time as an adult I'd been to Cornwall. Julian and Evelyn were perfect hosts for a couple of days, talking and drinking tea in their bright garden and reflecting on the spiritual path and Sufism and Hazrat Inayat Khan.

Julian's letters were very beautiful and practical, and over the years since I received them their words have taught me more and more, as I become a little bit maturer to understand them. He said he was drawn to Inayat Khan, the late Indian Sufi master, for "the gentleness and universality of his spirit", and described his own Sufi initiator, Virya Best, as an old lady who had "less ego than anyone I'd ever met".

He taught me to trust in my own experience and spiritual inspiration- that specific practices, teachings, schools, lineages, all ultimately are not crucial, although they might be very useful for many people. Instead he suggested I "believe you already have 'it', whatever 'it' is, and can develop it 'drop by drop, as the Buddha says'..."

He wrote: "Our ego can hide in many forms, even as our spiritual life and our spiritual teacher. So forget about it, and concentrate instead on the vibration of life which runs through every being and every object". He said that whatever we believe or have faith in, our faith in it draws Truth to us and guides us further on the path. What matters is to follow the guidance and inspiration in our life and heart, and all will be well.

"If you feel you need a guru then you probably do", Julian wrote, "but why go through anyone? All this is God!"

"The spiritual life is like the martial arts. It's about your next step... there is your star- your inspiration - and then there is your practical objective"... "living in the moment or, even better, the very next moment...", "we're not here to escape from human life, but to appreciate it all, the beauty of the stars and trees and human relationships".

All of us who enjoy our coming together in The Great Heart Society owe a lot to Julian: it was his words and spirit that taught me that it's ok to be open to everything, to trust innocently in the value of our gathering together in goodheartedness, that if we practice together from the heart then Truth will be drawn to us and we will be drawn to Truth. From my heart, I say thank you to him and consider him a true guide of the Heart.

"Truth is a line which runs from the human heart straight to the heart of God" he told me. May Julian's heart be alive and blessed in the Love and Peace of the God he believed in.

Chris Zang Starbuck,
19th January 2012

January Great Heart Circle

Our first Great Heart Circle of the year took the theme of blessings- how each human being can be a source of blessings and spiritual inspiration for any other. The purpose of gatherings like ours is to help us encounter each other in this kind of way, whereas if we met in other walks of life we might not be able to appreciate each other as fully. A Circle Practice like ours can be both a source and a generator of "baraka" as it's called in Arabic, or "adisthana" in Sanskrit- the power of blessings which help us grow.

To explore how a gathering could be a source of blessings, we looked at the Jewish practice of Shabbat, with the mystical sense of the Shabbat being a bride and a queen. We learned to sing a part of the Jewish song "Lekha Dodi" together, "Come O Beloved", to a beautiful tune. At the last part of our silent zen meditation session, we sang Lekha Dodi again, this time as a "niggun" - a tune sung without words - and invited the women present to feel that through them blessings were entering our circle, the men receptive to the womens' light.

During the meditation and the sacred meal at the end we lit candles, and listened to Jewish music from around the world.

Advent at Great Heart Circle

This evening's monthly Great Heart Circle had the theme of Advent. After the usual relaxation to begin, we discussed the notion of life and spiritual practice as a journey, as exemplified in two of the Christian Advent stories - the three Magi following their star, and Mary and Jospeh following local political orders to travel home for the census. Both journeys end in the symbolic stable at Bethlehem. We talked about our own journeys, including sacred pilgrimages in India and Turkey, and the unexpected detours we're led into by life.

We lit an Advent Candle to start our period of silent Zen meditation, approaching the sitting practice as an expression of Hope. Then we ended with shared food and drink, with Christmas crackers and nuts and biscuits.

November Great Heart Circle

This evening we held our monthly Great Heart Circle for training in Zen meditation in Leicester.

In place of a discussion this month, we had a movement workshop led by Marie. She had us synchronise our bodies and then introduce small changes to the movements, not only keeping together as a group but also becoming aware of how we notice the other people and their movements- how we perceive our environment, our habits of thought. As a second excercise she taught us "flocking", where we move as one unit following a leader, and then the leadership passes to someone else and we seamlessly switch to following them instead. So it was a kind of exercise both in harmonising with others and experiencing how we pass, receive and share the role of leading.

After silent meditation we had a meal again, listening to Gaelic singing about murderous lovers and romantic cows...

Rumi's Birthday Celebration

This evening in our monthly Great Heart Circle, we celebrated the birthday of our 'patron saint', Mevlana Jelaluddin Rumi. He was born 30th September 1207 in Afghanistan before moving to Anatolia where he lived, taught and created the poetrty he's loved for.

Mark had suggested we do something to honour the date, and by chance we ended up downstairs in the intimate room under our usual Garden Room in the Unitarian chapel. We held an evening of informal whirling training followed by silent meditation, whirling and singing together. So many cakes and sweets were brought that we couldn't begin to eat them all, so people went home with arms full of gifts from Mevlana Rumi!

Thanks to everyone for making it a very warm-hearted and enthusiastic celebration together.