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Happy 2025 Lunar New Year, my friends – the Year of the Snake! 🐍 

two of the snake’s positive characteristics are wisdom & transformation. may we embody both wisdom & transformation in this new year for the benefit of all in need.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#LunarNewYear #YearOfTheSnake #YearOfTheWoodSnake #wisdom #transformation #OpenHeart #path #practice #enso #snake #calligraphy #JinpaLhaga #JMWart

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if you know, you know 😏

whether it be The White Council & The Fellowship in Tolkien’s Hobbit & LOTRs, or the Jedi Order, the Resistance, & Rebels in Star Wars, or in this case The Order of The White Lotus in Avatar: The Last Airbender & The Legend of Korra, there are multiple generations – a whole population of us – raised on examples of people coming together to push back, disrupt, & overcome tyranny, while embracing the good, the light, & the just, to bring balance for the benefit of all.

so rest up, rise up, & resist dear friends. resist the ideology of cruelty, greed, & harm. embody love instead, manifesting fierce compassion for all who suffer & are in need.

“A true White Lotus member is not defined by their power, but by their compassion and unwavering commitment to the greater good.”

~ Uncle Iroh

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#OrderOfTheWhiteLotus #WhiteLotus #UncleIroh #bodhisattvas #OpenHeart #clarity #resilience #FierceCompassion #vow #path #practice #JinpaLhaga #JMWart

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compassion & mercy look like the work of bodhisattvas, any one of us who vows to work with our hearts & minds – ever opening & skillful – for the benefit of other beings & all life. 

such a vow, such a commitment – that looks like true power.

may we embrace & commit to such true power, the power of love, for the benefit of a world in need.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#power #love #compassion #mercy #OpenHearts #CalmMinds #bodhisattvas #vow #commitment #path #practice #RevBenjaminCremer #JinpaLhaga

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may our words & actions be sources of healing for all who have been harmed & for all the harm to come. may our healing work reverberate & ripple out, expanding to all who are hurting & suffering without exception, bias, or favor. may our hearts continue to open in empathy, putting love into action through mercy & compassion, living beautifully with grace & generosity.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#healer #healers #love #OpenHeart #empathy #mercy #compassion #generosity #grace #beauty #bodhisattvas #path #practice #MedicineBuddha #JinpaLhaga #JMWart

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i love this incredibly profound “Christ Collage” art by David Hayward (aka the Naked Pastor on social media). this is a picture of it hanging in my room. it speaks particularly & i’d say prophetically to this moment. can we see Christ in all people?
in Matthew chapter 25 of the Gospels, Jesus says in the parable of sheep & goats, “…as you did it to one of the least of these, you did it to me”…& respectively, “…as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.” from this, one of the richest & most meaningful of practices arises, to see Christ in all people. as Paul wrote in his letter to the Colossians, “…Christ is all and is in all.” (for more on this view, check out Richard Rohr’s book “The Universal Christ”.) if we see Christ in all people, how can we be cruel to them, harm them, oppress them, marginalize them, take away their rights, cage them, sweep them up in the middle of the night separating them from their family? see them as somehow less than human, less than the sacred beings that they are?
this teaching resonates deeply for me, both from my Christian upbringing, & now as a Buddhist practitioner seeing everyone as having buddhanature – the awakened pure luminous quality that is eternal & unchanging within all of us. i have no problem dancing between these languages. the mystic in me simply calls all of this Love – the Ultimate primordial energy from which all things come, are sustained, & return. vast & intimate at the same time. that which calls upon our hearts to open, participate, & act to reduce or end suffering, & bless life around us. (the Star Wars geek/nerd in me will call this The Force).

whatever the case, this Love is calling to us in this moment to bring clarity of purpose even while some in their delusion are sowing chaos & confusion to their own ends.

may we see Christ in ALL people, in all beings, & all life, & act with Love accordingly, without exception. may we recognize the buddhanature within ALL people, all beings, & all life, & answer the call from Love to act with love & be love in this world. may we speak this truth & protect the vulnerable, living by principle & vow, rather than fear or fealty to individuals in power.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#Christ #UniversalChrist #Jesus #buddhanature #Love #OpenHeart #bodhisattvas #vow #path #practice #ChristCollage #NakedPastor #RichardRohr #JinpaLhaga

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so we will continue to love ourselves & each other, as we are, in all of our beautiful authenticity, each a diverse, valuable, sacred, & worthy expression of life. 

in our love, we will look out for on another through word & action, protect one another from cruelty, heal one another from harm.

this is what love does. to have mercy & show mercy, born of empathy & brought to life through our compassion. a reflection of our own tender heart beneath delusion, the heart of the Universe, the Ultimate, the heart of God.

a choice that always remains ours, even at high cost.
may it be our intention, our vow, our practice, our power – to continue to love, which is the highest form of resistance.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#love #fear #courage #fascism #authoritarianism #delusion #freedom #resistance #rise #OpenHeart #healers #protectors #bodhisattvas #GeorgeOrwell #JinpaLhaga #JMWart 

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friends – 

with such an onslaught of executive actions & proposed policies that will harm, it can feel overwhelming. taking some sort of productive action to mitigate the harm can give us purpose & hope. there are many organizations that will advocate & take the fight for human & civil rights to the courts & halls of government on our behalf. this is just a quick list i put together for my blog & social media that work on behalf of democracy, refugees, immigrants, along with human/civil rights for all marginalized groups, & women’s reproductive freedoms. please see links provided or link in my bio for blog post w/ links.

may all be safe, healthy, happy, & free from suffering.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

Democracy Docket
Democracy Docket

Indivisible
Homepage | Indivisible

ACLU
Home | American Civil Liberties Union

NAACP Legal Defense Fund
Legal Defense Fund

Southern Poverty Law Center
https://www.splcenter.org/

Human Rights Campaign
HRC | Human Rights Campaign

Planned Parenthood
Planned Parenthood | Official Site

Center for Reproductive Rights
Center for Reproductive Rights

HIAS
Welcome the stranger. Protect the refugee.

IRC
International Rescue Committee | International Rescue Committee (IRC)

Evertytown For Gun Safety
Home | Everytown

Environmental Defense Fund
Environmental Defense Fund – Building a vital Earth for everyone

Greenpeace
Home – Greenpeace – Greenpeace

 

#democracy #LoveInAction #Resistance #Equity #SocialJustice #CivilRights #HumanRights #ReproductiveRights #BIPOC #LGBTQIA #refugees #immigrants #OpenHeart #bodhisattvas #path #practice #JinpaLhaga #JMWart #photography

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“Be a lamp, a lifeboat, a ladder. Help someone’s soul heal. Walk out of your house like a shepherd.” 

~ 

Rumi

even the smallest amount of light pierces the darkness. may we choose to be this for this world. it’s hard work, but it’s needed work. also, don’t forget to include yourself in your compassion.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#light #healers #bodhisattvas #OpenHeart #path #practice #Rumi #JinpaLhaga #JMWart #photography

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it’s only day one & there is already such a barrage. i don’t need to list all the executive orders or the harm already happening. it’s fully available to anyone who wants to see. mind your nervous systems w/ self-care & wisdom.

fascism’s strength is that it’s exhausting & relentless.

BUT it is indelibly tied to impermanence like every other created & constructed thing, & being out of balance & harmony w/ life itself, always fails eventually. perhaps this is why the grasping is so extreme, because deep down there is a knowing that it is bound to fail & beyond time has already failed.

our task is to connect to something deeper, to love – to the Ultimate, so that we can be available for the relative, to heal the harm, to build anew, & protect the vulnerable. now is the time to commit to such principle, to practice, to embodiment. we are the instruments of love the world needs.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#fascism #impermanence #harm #selfcare #vow #love #OpenHeart #path #practice #SofiaAliKhan #JinpaLhaga 

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love is the strongest thing we have & it will carry us forward together. it can’t be broken or shaken by outside forces. it resides in the deepest spaces within our being, because it is who we are.

it is up to each of us to find, in our own way, how to honor it & live by it. may we do so for the benefit of all beings & all life.

~j

⭕️♥️🙏🏼

#love #vow #commitment #OpenHeart #path #practice #JinpaLhaga #JMWart #calligraphy