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Mudita is the appreciation of the goodness of others. It seems to me important that we touch the beauty of the world, and the beauty of other peoples' hearts. This acknowledgement nourishes our own hearts, though we may find it difficult indeed to receive other people's goodness. This is something I have noticed in myself.

Many years ago when I was in Thailand, I used to work in the monastery kitchen. I would help the villagers cook the meals. After the meal, because they had their crops to do, I would say to them, 'Well, go home, and I'll look after the cleaning up.' There was one little girl who sometimes used to join us. She was an orphan. The villagers were a bit rough with her, so she used to snuggle under my wing. After the others had one home she would help me do the cleaning up. After wiping the floor, we would rinse the floor rags, and hang them on the line. One day I had just started rinsing the rags, when I suddenly felt this little girl washing my feet. While she was washing them, I could feel a rising panic, and an urge to stamp my feet; but because she was so small I had to hold still, otherwise I would have hurt her. So I held very still and endured my feelings. When she had finished washing my feet, she started on my hands. She took each of my hands, carefully washed one side, turned it over, and washed the other. At that point, my feelings of resistance vanished. I suddenly understood the gift she was offering me, in washing my hands and my feet, and I saw that the only thing that I could offer in return was the ability to receive it.

In our lives we must similarly be willing to receive, and be willing to be vulnerable. We must allow ourselves to be not always together, not always the best, as if we were telling the world 'We're perfectly alright without you, thanks mate.' If we keep everything safe and controlled for ourselves so that we have everything we need, we will have no space for the miracle of human kindness and generosity. Although we may keep our lives secure and walled off, this walling off means that we will never receive the precious beauty of the world. So to practise mudita, joy, we must allow ourselves to receive it. It goes so much against our conditioning. We can, even here, stop and reflect on where this meditation centre comes from, and feel the respect for people like Sharon and Joseph who twenty years ago, through some great faith, got this whole thing started, and then for all the people who have helped since.

~ The Divine Abidings, Excerpts of a talk given by Ajahn Thaniya at
the Insight Meditation Centre, Barre, Massachusetts, in April 1996.

May this be of benefit.