A Meditation on Ho'oponopono

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"I'm sorry. Please forgive me. I love you. Thank you."[/center]
My meditation today is on the source of the power of the Ho'oponopono prayer. This prayer seems unique in its depth and ability to communicate across cultural lines. That tells me the prayer is founded on principles that are universal to all human beings and to their participation in our shared reality-dance called Lila.

When considered individually, each of the prayer's four phrases describes a different aspect of my relationships - with myself, other people, the world at large, and with the divine. As an aside, if the word "divine" gives you indigestion as it used to do for me, feel free to substitute some other suitably universal concept.

Here's what each phrase means to me:

"I'm sorry."

This phrase acknowledges my personal responsibility for everything my actions contribute to the unfolding of What Is. By saying it I recognize that every action has both negative and positive effects. Even those acts I undertake with the most positive of intentions inevitably have negative outcomes that I must also own. As I'm fond of saying, "In this reality there are no one-sided coins." The same applies to my actions. In Shadow work we learn to recognize the value of the disowned aspects of our Self, those parts of our nature that society has deemed to be unacceptable. The acceptance of these qualities implied by the phrase "I'm sorry" is quintessential Shadow work, expressed in a very elegant shorthand.

"Please forgive me."

This phrase expresses my surrender. Not surrender in the Western sense of capitulation, but in the Eastern sense of "Acceptance of What Is." While the first phrase acknowledges my effects on others, this one acknowledges their effects on me. It recognizes the essential mutuality of existence - the equal importance and reciprocal influences of Other and Self - and completes the realization of interdependence that began with "I'm sorry."

"I love you."

Love is the emotion or force that unites me with the Universe that I am part of. When I am in love, or more precisely when I realize that I am Love, I feel the essential unity of All That Is. The great Advaita sage Nisargadatta Maharaj gave us this wonderful quote: "Love tells me I am everything. Awareness tells me I am nothing. Between these two my life flows." Meditators become familiar with the oceanic sense of the inclusive, seamless fabric of existence. In that universal awareness, the sense of myself as an independent individual submerges, and a singular emotion arises in me as a result. That emotion is love. By saying "I love you," I acknowledge myself and all other manifestations - whether living or inanimate, tangible or intangible - as intrinsic, essential parts of the universe. It's a reminder that I love all that I Am, where "I Am" is simultaneously and paradoxically one single fallible human being and an entire, intrinsically perfect Universe.

"Thank you."

When I have consciously expressed my realizations of personal responsibility, universal mutuality and Love as the Oneness of What Is, a sense of wonder and deep appreciation rises in me. My expression of gratitude for What Is and for my part in the unfolding reality then comes as naturally as breathing. This gratitude is not directed toward an external agent, as is traditional in most religious prayers or when we thank someone for doing us a favor. Again paradoxically, the object of this gratitude is simultaneously its subject - the One saying the prayer. For me the phrase is a reminder of what I see as the One True Miracle - existence itself. It's also a reminder of the value of humility in the presence of such majesty, and that as I learned from "I love you," everything in the Universe is an expression of that majesty.

"I'm sorry. Please forgive me. I love you. Thank you."