LINEAGE
Timeless wisdom lived through fatherhood
DAILY PRACTICE
YAHGUUDANG
Respect For All Living Beings
Story
A good friend once shared a word with me the word: Yahguudang. He simply said, "Here is a word for you!"
This reminded me to Thich Nhat Hanh teachings, the Vietnamese Buddhist monk who spent decades teaching peace in the middle of war, wrote something about anger that goes hand in hand with Yahguudang.
He said anger is not your enemy. It is a child crying inside you. And like any child who is crying, it does not need to be suppressed, argued with, or sent away. It needs to be held.
He described what he called "tending the anger" the practice of turning toward the feeling the way a mother turns toward a distressed infant. Not to fix it immediately. Not to make it stop. Just to acknowledge it was there, to breathe with it, to let it be seen before it was expressed.
Thich Nhat Hanh lived through the Vietnam War. He watched villages burn. He lost students and colleagues to violence. He had more reason than most men to carry uncontrollable rage. And yet people who sat with him consistently described the same thing, a quality of stillness that seemed to come not from the absence of feeling, from an intimate relationship with it.
Among the Haida Nation of the Pacific Northwest Coast, Yahguudang is described as the backbone of their entire way of being. Respect for all living things the land, the water, the ancestors, and each other. The Haida teach that you earn respect by demonstrating it first.
Children cannot defend themselves from a father's anger. They receive it fully, absorb it completely, and carry it quietly long after the moment has passed. The guilt that follows a father's loss of control is real. The anger is not the problem. What you do with it in the three seconds before it reaches your children is everything.
Shift
Your anger is not the enemy. What you do with it before it reaches your children is the practice.
Action (Today, With Your Children)
The next time you feel the anger rising, before you speak, stop.
Place one hand on your chest.
Take one slow breath that reaches your belly.
Tend the feeling for three seconds before it becomes a word.
Then speak or don't. That three second pause is where you find the Yahguudang.
Let what comes out be chosen, not discharged.
A father who can tend his own inner child rarely takes it out on the one standing in front of him.
You’re receiving this as part of a daily fatherhood practice
Thank you for being here
PASS IT FORWARD
They can suscribe and obtain this daily