Mental Fitness Magazine Volume 2 | Page 4

(PUBLISHER ( PUBLISHER’S CORNER A COUPLE OF YEARS AGO I ATTENDED THE INTERNATIONAL BRAIN, MIND AND BODY CONFERENCE. One of the speakers, Marion Woodman, author and one of the world’s foremost Jungian analysts, shared the dream that changed her life. The dream began with her finding a dead bird in the garden. With the sorrow of loss, she carefully wrapped the bird in a silk scarf and gently put it in a little black box, which she took up to the attic, where it became a forgotten memory. Woodman’s poem describes the rest of the dream: ( ( She dreamed a voice told her, “Go to the attic and find the black box.” Still dreaming, she found it and slipped her hand in. She gently lifted out a bird, tiny, skeletal, starving. Stricken, she wept for this bird she had loved as a child and then forgotten. Her tears changed its body into a radiant small boy who said, “But I only wanted to sing my song.” Her dream had a profound effect on me and, judging from the silence in the room, the entire audience. “But I only wanted to sing my song.” Is this not all any of us want to do in our lives? Sing our song? Sing our song without restraint? Without violence, hatred and abuse? When you reflect on life from the perspective that each and every living being, like you, just wants to sing their song, that’s the start to building compassion for yourself and all sentient beings. Welcome to the Special Edition of Mental Fitness Magazine. We are honoured to present to you His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, the world’s foremost Buddhist leader. He has travelled extensively to speak in favour of ecumenical understanding, kindness and compassion, respect for our environment, and most of all, world peace. “Love and insight work cooperatively to bring about enlightenment, like the two wings of a bird.” FOR RECOMMENDED READING PLEASE TAP HERE Love and Peace, Ute Lawrence