The Week Ahead!

http://www.wheresthemoon.com/nextweekreview.html
TAURUS AND TAURUS RISING

You’ve probably been hoping, wishing and praying that Whoever (or Whatever) has been peering around corners and relentlessly pursuing you would take a coffee break and leave you the hell alone. With a possible result you perceive as your complete undoing, has the thought already occurred to you that this annoying “pursuer” is maybe a cosmic force that is occurring to bring a much needed change into your life or may be just a product of your own actions?

GEMINI AND GEMINI RISING

When you turn to old friends and associations, if you’re honest with yourself and take a good long look, you realize that the old gang simply is NOT what it used to be. You can find some comfort in reminiscing about the old days and times gone by, but it definitely gets old. We know it’s kind of unsettling to be facing a future with no clear goals, but you’ve got to admit that giving up the security blanket would set you free at last.

from _How To Be Compassionate_

Meditation
Consider the so-called enemy this way:
1. Because this person's mind is untamed, he or she engages in activities that are harmful to you.
2. If anger--the wish to harm--were part of the basic nature of this person, it could not be altered in any way, but as we have seen, hatred does not reside in the nature of a person.
3. Even if it were the nature of a person to hate, then, just as we cannot get angry at fire because it burns our hand (it is the very nature of fire to burn), so we should not get angry at a person expressing his or her nature.
4. This said, hatred is actually peripheral to a person's nature. When a cloud covers the sun we do not get angry at the sun, so we should not get angry with the so-called enemy, but instead hold the person's afflictive emotion responsible.
5. We ourselves sometimes engage in bad behavior, do we not? Still, most of us do not think of ourselves as completely bad. We should look on others the same way.
6. Therefore, the actual troublemaker is not the person, but his or her afflictive emotion.
When we lose our temper, we don't hesitate to use harsh words, even to a close friend. Afterward, when we calm down, we feel embarassed about what happened. This indicates that we, as persons, do not really want to use such harsh words, but because we were dominated by anger, we lost our self-control.
As I mentioned earlier, we can learn to separate a corner of the mind from strong emotions like hatred and observe the mind from this vantage point; this indicates that the mind and hatred are not one, therefore the person and hatred are not one.

http://www.amazon.com/How-Be-Compassionate-Handbook-Creating/dp/1451623909

10 Day Meme - Day Eight: Three pet peeves.

1) Adult females stuck in "I'm a Princess, Rescue Me" mode [your choices in relating to a person who insists on living in this story: knight/prince, evil stepfamily, evil monster, or, if you can keep being entertaining and helpful and do everything they want, when they want you to, you can be a loyal servant or a 'magickal object'...of course, as soon as you say 'no' or want something for yourself, you get to be evil stepfamily or terrible dragon. Women who play Princess Rescue Me all their lives don't have friends, they have servants, magical objects, persecutors, and rescuers. There is no such thing as an authentic relationship with these poor helpless (manipulative, passive agressive) little victims]

2) The Silent Treatment. [I've pondered this one before, the 'silent treatment' vs the 'no contact rule'. What it boiled down to for me was that silent treatment is someone being manipulative and passive aggressive and trying to control another person by withholding themselves and avoiding constructive dialogue and communication. Whereas 'no contact' involves shutting down access to yourself after someone has proven themselves to be toxic when given said access. If everything you say or do becomes ammunition for the other person to hurt you with, then it's likely that 'no contact' is a good idea. If one person is a toxic abuser and the other one just wants to be left alone, The Silent Treatment is a very good self-protecting thing to do. If there are two people who basically respect and care about each other and want to have a good relationship, but some misunderstanding or hurt feelings have come up, then the Silent Treatment is a Bad Sign.]

3) Hypocrisy. (yes, I know.)