Mantra Monday: May you find what you’re looking for (a prayer)

I had my business credit card numbers stolen recently. Someone Ubered around LA and ordered $75 dollars worth of takeout.

After the initial surprise of the discovery wore off and I’d called the bank to report the charges, I sat there wondering about how it feels to be someone who commits a crime, and how underneath the joyride feeling of getting away with something, there’s got to be a deep sense of not okay-ness. Of missing something or needing something or wanting something that you don’t know how to get any other way.

And my thoughts turned to a prayer of forgiveness and a wish for them. May you find what you’re looking for, what you need. May you be given the lessons that allow you to fill the hole in a way that serves others instead of taking away from others. May you find happiness. May your inner light shine.

May you find what you’re looking for.

I whisper this prayer to a woman I know who is desperately searching for herself and whose actions in that pursuit tug on old stories in me.

I send it out to our political leaders who are making decisions based on hatred and fear.

I say it silently to myself when I’m staring into the cupboard, knowing that what I need can’t be found in food.

It’s my simplified, on-the-go version of the loving-kindness prayer, and it feels so much better than hanging on to anger.

I invite you to say it with me this week. Come up with your own version or do the full loving-kindness meditation. The important thing is to make it work for you.