The Importance of Nurture

by Graeme Chapman

Many of us, in the West, in spite of the availability of nourishing food, have poor diets. We eat refined foods and little fruit or vegetables. We have become addicted to fast food. Those who can afford restaurant meals frequently over-indulge. We overeat without adequate exercise.

Our eating habits are symptomatic of a broader malaise. They reflect the inadequate care we take of our bodies, minds, souls, and spirits, and the lack of attention we give to nurturing the communities and nations to which we belong, and the planet that supports our existence. We respond to emergencies, but fail to lay the groundwork for sustained nurture.

Personal nurture

Our self-nurture needs to be comprehensive, with attention being given to our bodies, minds, souls, and spirits.

Our Bodies

We will be expressing our gratitude to our bodies for the gifts and opportunities they offer by first ensuring that our diet is adequate and well balanced. This gratitude will also find expression in the way we approach the food we eat. We [273] will eat slowly, thankfully, and meditatively. Our usual pattern, because we are in a hurry, and preoccupied, is to gulp our food down.

It is also important to exercise regularly. While exercise will benefit us at every stage in our lives, it becomes critical as we age. If we do not exercise adequately, we may become depressed, or susceptible to diseases that may otherwise be avoided. There are exercises, like Tai Chi and certain yogic practices, which exercise the body and spirit at the same time.

It is also important for us to listen to our bodies, to dialogue with them, to befriend them, and to treat them courteously, affectionately, and graciously. Our bodies can also benefit enormously from the relaxation that accompanies disciplined meditative practice.

Mind

We can exercise our minds by stretching our cognitive capacity.

We can learn to read with flexible speed, sometimes slowing down to wrestle with difficult concepts, or to meditate on what we are reading, and sometimes increasing the pace, particularly with literature that requires little more than skimming. Learning to adjust our reading speed to the material that we are reading is not difficult.

We can also tutor our minds to deal with increasingly difficult subject matter by gently pushing limits, by reading books that extend our capacity for understanding and comprehension. This has been a practice I have found to be of great benefit. It is like an athlete working on increasing their speed and endurance. [274]

It is also important for us to explore our minds, our thinking, to observe how we think, to become witnesses to inner processes. In doing this we are training ourselves to be aware, to be completely focused on the subject of our awareness, whether it be a physical object, another person, ideas, or the way we process thoughts and emotions. Buddhists place great emphasis on mindfulness, on being aware, penetratingly aware. This mindfulness is fostered by a range of meditative exercises, which can help us explore higher levels of consciousness.

We also benefit from observing the dynamics of the cultural mind, the pastiche of ideological commitments, shared values, and subliminal energies that characterize cultures. The insights gained from cross-cultural comparisons are enormously important in the development of understanding and empathy, and in negotiating compromises. They are also enriching. In fact, without the ability to enter into the inwardness of other people's worldviews, we are handicapped in our assessment of the distinctives of our own.

Our minds can be further nurtured by expanding our consciousness to the extent that we become aware of a Universal Mind, a Universal Spirit, or Consciousness, of which our minds, our spirit, and our consciousness are partial expressions.

To treat our minds to these enhancing exercises is preferable to allowing them to atrophy, or marinade in cognitive and moral effluent. [275]

Soul

It is also important for us to nurture our souls. In using the word "soul", I am referring to that part of us that echoes back to us the depth dimensions of our thoughts, feelings, and personal transactions.

We can nurture our souls by quiet reflective walks through the bush, or along beaches. Australia's red centre engages our souls, inviting a response. While nature is red in tooth and claw, with species feeding upon species, there is something about the luxuriant life of the planet that has the capacity to nurture us.

We can nurture our souls by cultivating a deeper awareness of our feelings, by exercising our imagination, and by opening ourselves to intuitive insights.

We also feed our souls by reading literature that takes us beyond superficiality into reality, by admiring or engaging in art work, by listening to or producing music, by creating things, whether they be tables, musical instruments, computer programs, gardens or quilts. Whatever our craft, that craft can nurture our souls as well as the souls of those admiring our handiwork.

Spirit

In nurturing our souls we cannot help engaging our spirits, those aspects of us that we experience as numinous, or sacred. It is the spirit that discerns evidence of a Spirit Presence within us, in our relationships with others, and in the universe. We can nurture our spirits by exploring more comprehensive levels of consciousness, and thereby enhancing our discernment of this Presence.

Broadening Circles

We do not exist in isolation, but within a broadening circle of relationships. These relationships, with individuals, local [276] communities and nations, nurture us. It is important that we, in turn, contribute to their capacity to be nurturing.

Individual Relationships

We are nourished by others. In childhood we are surrounded by caregivers, usually our parents. Where this nourishing is absent we are diminished. Where we are savaged, rather than nurtured, we find we need to deal with painful, emotional scarring. We are also nurtured by those we consider heroes. It is likely that we will be influenced by a succession of heroes.

In our turn, we influence others. Ainslie Mears, a psychologist, has written an intriguing little book that explores the subtle, and not so subtle ways we influence others. The effect we have on others is frequently unintended. At the same time, it is important for us to deliberately plan to nurture others positively, without imposing ourselves on them. This involves a commitment, on our part, to become the sort of people that unselfconsciously nurture and inspire others by the sheer quality of our lives.

Communities

We are also influenced by the communities in which we live. Communal influences are both positive and negative. Communities can nurture or destroy us. The capacity of communities to nurture their members is dependent on the commitment of their members to contribute to this nurture. Given our unique personalities, capacities, and situations, it is important for us to determine how we can positively contribute to the nurturing of the communities of which we are a part, and to the lives of those who make up those communities. [277]

Involvement in the life of communities is ultimately political. Communities are not amorphous collections of individuals, but organized societies. Those societies are led by people with the interest and initiative to accept positions of responsibility. The political contribution that we make to society may involve our ensuring that the physical and social environment is as nourishing for others as we are capable of making it.

The nature of our involvement will depend upon the way the society is structured, and the gifts we have to offer. Direct involvement in the political process, as leaders, as active supporters of political parties, as political activists, or as responsible voters, does not exhaust the political contribution we can make. Those who are centres of love, who provide warmth, hospitality and practical help, are equally involved in the political process. Love is political. Love both demands and complements political initiative.

The Planet

We have taken the ecosystem for granted. We now realize how fragile it is, and are aware that we have damaged it through our ignorance and avarice. It is important that we work at arresting further devastation and restore what health we can to the planet. To do this we need to develop a respect for life.

Engaging elements of the ecosystem with our feelings, as well as our minds, fosters an empathetic connection to all living things, a connection that is strengthened through meditation, which brings to us an awareness of the fact that the Spirit that sources our lives is present, as the sustaining energy, in every element of the physical universe. [278]

Summary

It is important for us to nurture ourselves - our bodies, minds, souls and spirits. It is also important for us to contribute to the nurture of others - our friends, those we work with, the groups with which we mix, the communities in which we live, the nations to which we belong, and the planet that supports our existence. None of this happens naturally, or very little of it. It requires deliberation, commitment, and considerable effort. [279]

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People are often told they need to take better care of themselves. This can be a difficult concept to understand and practice. Either people have learned at a very early age that they are supposed to care for others or they have never been nurtured and therefore simply don't know how to do it.

To nurture means to honor, value, esteem and care for. In order to care for yourself it is necessary to ask the question, what is the self? Simply asking that question directs the attention to what can be called the conscious self. And once you give attention to that conscious self, it is encouraged to grow and develop. Very simply, to nurture the self is to explore the self, to know the self.

This is a good time then to reflect on who you are. Take inventory.

• How is your physical being?
• Does it need attention?
• What kind of attention does it need?
• How is your emotional self?
• Does it need attention?
• What kind of attention?
• How is your spiritual self?
• Are you taking time to connect with the greater consciousness, your soul and spirit?

The inventory does not need to become a pressure, yet another thing to do in a life that may be already filled with many tasks and demands. It is simply a framework for spending time with yourself, giving yourself attention. Try to find small ways of meeting the needs you become aware of. If your physical being is tired, look for an hour that day to do something relaxing. Keep your response to the inventory simple.

Loving, affirming attention is in itself nurturing. So many people in modern society have been starved for simple loving, nurturing attention. Take time this month to give yourself that attention. And then, perhaps, if you feel like it, take the time to give someone else that attention.

That someone else can be an animal, a tree in your backyard, a friend, a partner, a child. That attention does not have to be given in the form of an inventory, lots of questions. It can be given in the form of an invitation: let's spend some time together. You can sit down with a tree and notice the delicate, intricate details of the bud, the leaves coming out, the bark. You can spend time with an animal, a cat curled in your lap, a walk with a dog, stopping to notice the bird flying overhead, stopping to say hello.

You can invite a friend to dinner, light a candle, listen to music together. Take a child to the park. And as you pay attention to the detail of the experience, its texture, its richness, your consciousness expands, your experience of life and yourself deepens, your awareness grows.

As you hold the child's hand, really hold it, and notice what it feels like. Feel the energy passing from one to another, feel the connection. With this kind of attention, in nurturing another you do truly nurture yourself. Attention is nurturing. That which you give attention to flourishes and grows, gathers energy.

So the meditation for this month is simply to nurture yourself by being more aware in the moments of your life. It's not a task, a duty, a burden. It's an act of love.

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