A Pause for Reflection and Prayer

Once again, I am linking with Angela at Tracing Rainbows for her Pause in Advent.  This week, she is pausing to pray.

I choose to begin and end my days with prayers.  The morning prayer is fairly short - I turn on the altar light, give thanks for a safe night, and pray for a good day.  At night, I recite several prayers,  pray for good health for myself and others, pray for those family members who have died, pray for my daughter, and for myself. In between waking up and going to sleep, I pray when I am driving, when I go for my walks, when I water the garden, etc.  Some people hum, I pray.

Prayer has sustained me through various difficulties and dark periods.  I prayed the entire time during my biopsy which diagnosed my cancer.  I prayed as long as I consciously could when I went for my lumpectomy and my cousin, who waited with my daughter in the waiting room, prayed for me during the surgery.  I prayed while I was being given powerful chemicals, drop by drop, intravenously, during my chemo therapy sessions.  I prayed while I lay under the radiation apparatus, while death rays tried to kill any errant cancer cells.  And, I know that many others prayed for me, too.  The monks at the temple,family and friends, members in the monthly prayer group I attend, members in the congregation in the church my daughter's friend's mother attends, several blogging friends who put me on their prayer lists, all held my daughter and me up in their prayers.  I know that those prayers, in combination of the treatments I received, and continue to receive, are what have enabled me to be a survivor of three years and counting.

Last night, at the monthly rosary prayer gathering, a special prayer was said for a member of the extended family whose cancer has progressed to an extent the doctors can't treat her any further.  A prayer for the end of her suffering; a prayer for a peaceful end to her life; a prayer for comfort and strength for her family.

This is the time of year when there is a lot going on, with many people busy with preparations for the upcoming holidays and festivities, decorating and baking and stressing over the perfect gift to give, etc.  It can also be a time when people feel more alone than at other times of the year, when all the festivities only seem to heighten the sorrows and lack in their lives.

So, I am pausing in my decorating to offer a prayer for those who have no homes.  I am pausing in my preparations of special meals to offer a prayer for those who are hungry.  I am pausing in my search for the perfect gift to offer a prayer for those who have nothing.  My pause in the middle of all my holiday preparations and gift making is to offer a prayer of empathy, loving-kindness, benevolence, and well-being to all living beings:

"May all being be well, happy, and at ease;
May they feel safe and secure"

From the Karaniya Metta Sutta or Discourse on Loving-Kindness.  The original Pali stanza reads:

Sukhino va khemino hontu
Sabbe satta bhavantu sukhi tatta

There are various translations in English, where the Pali word "sukha" is translated as happy, safe, comfortable, secure, at ease, etc.  But the intent is benevolence towards others.

May your day and the week ahead be filled with well being.