February 2026 Week 2

Victor Frankel:
“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing. The last of human freedoms to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
I love this quote and to think it is from a man while in a concentration camp. This week in class and on our meditation I went through an introspection exercise about how we are seeing life right now which beautifully lines up with our intention - What We Focus on We Become.
The book by John O’Donohue talks about our vision through our human eyes, here are some excerpts:

“The universe finds its deepest reflection and belonging in the human eye.
The eye, when it opens, is like the dawn breaking in the night. When it opens, a new world is there.
Many of us have made our world so familiar that we do not see it anymore.
What did I really see this day?
Maybe your eyes were unconditioned reflexes operating all day without any real mindfulness or recognition; while you looked out from yourself, you never gazed or really attended to anything.
It is a startling truth that how you see and what you see determine how and who you will be. **(our intention stated differently)***
This is an interesting way of beginning to do some interior work by exploring your particular style of seeing.
Ask yourself, What way do I behold the world?

He goes on to describe 7 styles of vision:
1.To the fearful eye, all is threatening. When you look toward the world in a fearful way, all you see and concentrate on are things that can damage and threaten you.
2.To the greedy eye, everything can be possessed. greedy people can never enjoy what they have, because they are always haunted by that which they do not yet possess.
The motor and agenda of greed is always the same. Joy is possession, but sadly possession is ever restless; it has an inner insatiable hunger. Greed is poignant because it is always haunted and emptied by future possibility; it can never engage presence.
Having has become the sinister enemy of being.
3.To the judgmental eye, everything is closed in definitive frames. It is always excluding and separating, and therefore it never sees in a compassionate or celebratory way. To see is to judge. Sadly, the judgmental eye is always equally harsh with itself. It sees only the images of its tormented interiority projected outward from itself.
The judgmental eye harvests the reflected surface and calls it truth.
4.To the resentful eye, everything is begrudged. People who have allowed the canker of resentment into their vision can never enjoy who they are or what they have. They are always looking out toward others with resentment. Perhaps they are resentful because they see others as more beautiful, more gifted, or richer than themselves. The resentful eye lives out of its poverty and forgets its own inner harvest.
5.To the indifferent eye, nothing calls of awakens.
Without even knowing it, indifference can place you beyond the frontiers of compassion, heal-ing, and love. When you become indifferent, you give all your power away. Your imagination becomes fixated in the limbo of cynicism and despair.
6.To the inferior eye, everyone else is greater. Others are more beautiful, brilliant, and gifted than you.
The inferior eye is always looking away from its own treasures. It can never celebrate its own presence and potential. The inferior eye is blind to its secret beauty. The human eye was never designed to look up in a way that inflates the Other to superiority, nor to look down, reducing the Other to inferiority. To look someone in the eye is a nice testament to truth, courage, and expectation. Each one stands on common, but different, ground.
7.To the loving eye, everything is real.
unless you see a thing in the light of love, you do not see it at all. Love is the light in which we see light. Love is the light in which we see each thing in its true origin, nature, and destiny. If we could look at the world in a loving way, then the world would rise up before us full of invitation, possibility, and depth.
The loving eye can even coax pain, hurt, and violence toward transfiguration and renewal.
The loving eye is bright because it is autonomous and free. It can look lovingly upon anything.
It rises above the pathetic arithmetic of blame and judgment and engages experience at the level of its origin, structure, and destiny. The loving eye sees through and beyond image and effects the deepest change.

Vision is central to your presence and creativity. To recognize how you see things can bring you self-knowledge and enable you to glimpse the wonderful treasures your life secretly holds.”

I am on my way back to Florida for my mother in law’s funeral followed by rich time with family and later in the week dear friends. I am blessed to be spending time with everyone as we celebrate the life of my sweet mother in law who saw the world with loving eyes. She never showed greed, resentment, judgement, indifference or inferiority. As for fear, who knows. However, I do think it is human to be fearful and we all are in some way. She always saw the good in all of us and celebrated every small milestone we shared with her - true loving eyes. I sometimes questioned what felt like a not attentiveness from her - she didn’t overwhelm you with phone calls or visits but again when she was with you she was all in and present. What I sometimes viewed as not attentive was actually a graceful mom and grandma letting go of her adult son in a healthy way and there with the hugest smile and all ears when you called on her. My one sister in law was blessed with having GG live near her and her kids in their formative years and my other sister in law called my mother in law everyday for years - they were and are examples of loving eyes on my mother in law. GG was an example for me of someone who was present to whatever life presented her in that moment with no wanting for more or wanting anything to be other than it was in that moment - that is a beautiful way to live! I have heard suffering described as desperately wanting life to be something other than it is - she did not suffer…..until the end. Sadly she suffered from dementia for too many years and was unable to tell us how she was suffering. We are all grateful her suffering is over and as my husband pointed out a few weeks ago when we were all there for her last days - “her last gift to us was she brought us all together”.

How are you seeing your life right now? How do you want to see your life right now? I am often the manufacturer of my own unnecessary suffering. Do you relate?
Can you use the meditation and yoga class as a chance to move inward with a little self study as we continue to pause, rest and reset in winter.