President’s Message

I like to thank Joe for his service to NCUU and look forward to sitting on the board with him as he serves out Gordon’s term as Board Director. I also like to thank Holly for her service as secretary, she always had or could find the answer to any question the board had. Thank you Holly.

I like to take a moment to thank everybody who attended the annual meeting. We now have a new vice president, Connie Hart and three new Board members Tom Hibbard, Shirley Leonard and Don Wright. We also have a new nominating committee Judy Capone, Jeanne Wright and Peter Freeman. The Budget was passed along with the By Law changes. There was a good discussion on how the budget is made and I have received a number of emails about how we do our annual meeting, which I will discuss with the new board of director.

This Month, I would like to discuss loving kindness. It’s Buddhist term which relations to mindful practice designed to increase love and compassion first to ourselves, and then to our love ones and the to our friends.

Practicing loving kindness is like saying a prayer for yourself or someone else. You actively send loving and kind wishes to yourself or others, and recite in your mind words and phrases that express good will toward yourself or other. When I have a negative thought about a loved one, I then try to think of a positive thought to balance the negative thought. To start, choose a person to send loving kindness toward. You can start with yourself or with somebody you love. You can sit stand or lie down, begin by breathing slowly and deeply. Open the palm of your hands, and then bring the person to mind. Radiate loving kindness by reciting a set of warm wishes, such as ‘May you be happy’ or a phrase of your choosing. Repeat the phrase slowly continue until you feel the loving kindness toward that person. Start with the people you love and then you can expanse to friends and difficult people and finally to all beings.

Some of this is a paraphrase from a hand out by Martha M Linehan.

Thanks!
Rob