How do you work to transform your relationship with your ancestors, or to transform their unhelpful seeds in you?Д«elow is a gatha and meditation from Thich Nhat Hanh for considering our ancestors.Д®njoying Lunch in the Historical DimensionДЇrom Cultivating the Mind of Love by Thich Nhat HanhД®njoying lunch in the historical dimension,.Are there times when you feel more, or less, connected to your roots?.

What shows up for you when you consider your ancestors?.

We will begin our Dharma sharing with these questions: I hope you can join us Thursday or Friday evening as we address our relationships with our ancestors.

I can take care of both the pride and shame that arise in me, and make an effort to nourish only those seeds I want to plant for future generations. When I can be open, gentle, and curious, I notice that I am more able to see their strength and their suffering, as well as their challenges and failings. But I do have a choice about how I respond. It is helpful for me to notice that I did not ask for any of the conditions around me or the emotional patterns that I have inherited from my ancestors. And like garbage from a stream that shows up in the river it feeds, I have become aware of the history of pain and privilege that resides in me. I now see myself as a river, and my ancestors are like tributaries that flow into me. Slowly, through the practice of mindfulness, IвЂve begun to recognize the ways in which they are very alive in me. I used to see my ancestors as very separate from me вЂ“ almost as if they were characters in a book that I had been randomly assigned to read. While it has always been easy for me to see all the privileges my grandparents had, IвЂ™m only beginning to recognize the connections, culture, and sense of belonging they may have lacked or longed for. They were born to immigrant families in crowded tenements, and as adults realized the American dream in a suburban home, complete with a Cadillac and country club membership. Only upon reflection does it occur to me what a head-spinning transition it must have been. Gone was nearly every trace of the language, religion, or traditions their parents had brought to this country just a generation earlier.

It has been important for me to explore how my family went from old-world farmers and merchants to being part of an American culture defined by white supremacy, with both all of the privileges that it afforded them and the sacrifices to their history and traditions it cost them.ДЄs a child, it was hard to for me to detect any evidence of their Eastern European Jewish linage in my grandparentвЂ™s ample and immaculate Long Island home.

As I strive to fight racism in myself and in the world, IвЂ™ve begun to look deeply into the nature of whiteness that IвЂ™ve inherited from those who came before me. As I sit with the upheaval and uncertainty of this global pandemic, IвЂ™ve found myself wondering about the changes and challenges my forbearers lived through. My ancestors have been very present for me recently. Silver Spring, Maryland, Community Online on Thursday Evening

My ancestors smile upon me