A Guided Meditation by Vinny Allegrini for AFJ Sunday

A Guided Meditation by Vinny Allegrini for Action for Justice Sunday at Community Church of New York Unitarian Universalist.

I'm Vinny Allegrini, and I'm a member of the Action for Justice Committee here at Community Church of New York Unitarian Universalist.
For today's prayer, meditation or contemplation, we're going to do something a little bit different: I'm going to lead a short, guided meditation.
I invite you to get comfortable, close your eyes, breathe, and bring your full attention to what we are doing right now together.
If you notice some mental chatter and you find yourself thinking about things that might happen in the future, or about things that happened in the past, tell those thoughts that you'll make time for them later, but for these few minutes, you wish to focus on what is going on right now, on being fully here.
Take a deep breath, and as you release it, feel yourself letting go of whatever fears and worries you might have been holding on to. The opposite of love is not hate, but fear, and this fear can deaden us. Take another deep breath, and as you release it, feel yourself letting go of whatever anger or hatred you might have been holding on to. Even the most justifiable anger can be like a cancer of your spirit. Your anger can do more harm to you than it does to whatever or whomever you are angry at. Take another deep breath, and feel yourself just being, just being here, and being here together with us as your best self.
See in your mind a little ball of golden light. Watch this light as it begins to grow larger and larger, until it now covers the entire inner vision of your mind. That golden light is your spirit, your passion, your intelligence, your love, your life force, and your connection to the universe. For some of us, it's how we think of god. For others, it is something different. But, for all of us, it is who we are as human beings together. And it is wonderful. Feel this golden light radiate through our being.

One of our most valued, shared beliefs is that doing good actions is more important than thinking good thoughts and believing good things. But actions must begin with thoughts and beliefs, so as you feel your calm mind filled with this loving golden light, I invite you to, as Mohandas Gandhi said, "be the change you want to see in the world."

Notice how this feels. Remember how this feels.
Take a deep breath, open your eyes, feel your rejuvenated energy to take action for justice together with us. And please repeat with me together a closing I learned from Janice Marie Johnson, our Director of Lifespan Religious Education: "Ma-sa-khane" and again "Ma-sa-khane."

"Masakhane" is a wonderfully rich and resonant word from the Na-Gu-Ni [Nguni] language, one of the many languages of South Africa. Loosely translated it means, "Let us build together."

2008 Copyleft: Sharing and adaptation is encouraged for any non-commercial use with attribution. Please see http://MarkandVinny.com/meditation

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• prayer
• guided
• meditation
• contemplation

[GuidedMeditationCD]

Thanks for this :-)