Metta-for

Hunger is the worst of diseases ~ the Buddha

Thursday, March 1, 2012

What is Mettāphor-- and what's it good for, anyway?


A few years ago, I'd say, "It's a metaphor, silly (bat, bat). Everything."
But you're not silly and I've put down the jeweled skewer of the Metaphor Queen for something new.

Food Metaphor is wonderful stuff--I stake my Self on its power to embody All. On the other blog, I spent years honing this very idea, but also...carefully crafting how much I would give of it. 
Paring out the brown spots, cropping out the mess in the sink, tinkering with the sticky bread-dough elasticity of my own metaphors, and concealing the fact that no matter what it looks like, the first one's always a pancake.
Till I found myself, hands in the air with meat loaf hands, with no one to turn on the spigot for me. But me.
Pema Chodron: "That's not the sort of news we really like to hear."
Talk about a mess to clean up. 

Meta means beyond, and in Pali, Mettā means a basic lovingkindness (or the Sanskrit, Maitri). And I am now wondering, with a substantial Mettāthud, how I thought that other blogging would "go" somewhere, when I wasn't willing to go beyond myself and really give anything. My recipes and posts were intended to please but not really give myself. They were more like a public butchery--and that is not free, that's a straight-up paid service.
All we really have to give is our true Selves and what we can make.
A blog can be a convenient place to practice not doing that. 

Though I had set myself on The Path and had put down one terrifying addiction, I wasnt "improving"---I was so stuck. 
I think because my writing wasn't really for some greater purpose. What I was creating and endlessly describing was like some bread wreath ourobouros of...stuckness.
That's an addiction, too.
I did not bake more love, to myself or anyone else. I could intellectualize and describe, step-by-step, how to bake such love, but I didn't really follow the recipe, and then I couldn't understand why it didn't turn out.

The thing with baking is, it's pretty precise--and I'm a kitchen rebel (no measuring for ME!!!) 
I have learned that baking embodies chemistry and art--and so do we.

The spirit of Mettā  is to offer a lovingkindness toward one's self, too. Frankly, it's kind to me to bake love (or forgiveness or peace) to you, no matter what you do, or whether or not you push the plate away.

It's kind of simple, as my theories go: 
Mettā (love for self and others) + phor (given for something greater) = Feeling FULL.

So that's Mettāphor, and that's the blog. Let us eat and practice.

I know, it seems radical--indulgent even!--to practice lovingkindness toward your self...but that is what I'm after here.  I really missed this part, for the longest time.
As my grandmother Viola used to say, "Try it, you might like it."
Who can argue with that?


I'm trying Mettā. And I like it.


If you want to know how it functions for me personally (right this second) it's a reset button a relief valve...a feeling of true refuge.
Its a balm for my own heart to say to it: you are basic goodness, you are trying, its enough, its okay, you get a fresh start.

I'm not an expert on this, but like an infant, something inside me knows enough to root for the milk of lovingkindness. 
I know that the ultimate Mettāphor can be found in me inviting you in to my kitchen of peacefoodlove...in this time. It's central and clean and well lit now--and it's open.

Here [breaks off a hunk of the The Good Bread]. I made this. It's by no means perfect, but it's still warm and it's good. Would you like to share?


I promise there'll be "enough": food, recipes, pictures, music and good heavens there will be Mettāphor, because that's just what I do, and that is what I have to give.

And in the end, the love you bake, is equal to the love you make.
Somehow, I think Mr. McCartney's okay with this recipe revision.



1 comment:

  1. mỹ nhân.

    - Được vị tiên sinh này ra giá một trăm kim tệ, còn có ai ra giá cao hơn không?

    Vân Phỉ Phỉ một lần nữa thánh thót hỏi mọi người.

    Một trăm lẻ năm kim tệ.
    đồng tâm
    game mu
    cho thuê phòng trọ
    cho thuê phòng trọ
    nhac san cuc manh
    tổng đài tư vấn luật miễn phí
    văn phòng luật
    số điện thoại tư vấn luật
    thành lập công ty

    Ở trên lầu hai một hắc y thanh niên cắn răng nói, ánh mắt của hắn cũng nhìn về phía Vân Phỉ Phỉ mà không rời đi được.

    Nhìn thấy mọi người gọi giá, trong lòng Nhạc Thành thầm nghĩ: Quả không hổ là mỹ nhân hại nước hại dân, xem ra những nam nhân này vì nàng mà liều mạng cũng không hối tiếc.

    Cuối cùng Vân Phỉ Phỉ cũng bán được một cuốn hoàng cấp cao giai đấu khí với giá một trăm hai mươi lăm kim tệ, được hắc y thanh niên mua.

    - Vật đấu giá thứ hai chính là một bí kíp ma pháp công kích có giá khởi điểm là hai mươi kim tệ.

    Vân Phỉ Phỉ lấy một khối hộp gấm từ đệ tử phía dưới mà mở ra, ở bên trong là

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