A daily contemplative practice where we approach each person as if meeting them for the first time, releasing accumulated preferences and presumptions.
Rabia's spiritual practice involved continuous renewal of her relationship with the Divine, meeting each moment as if encountering it for the first time. Applied to favoritism, this becomes the practice of Beginner's Love: the commitment to approach each person with fresh curiosity, releasing our accumulated stories about them. We typically relate to people through layers of history, preference, and projection—the colleague we've decided is difficult, the family member we've written off, the group we've stereotyped. These narratives create favoritism: we treat people according to our judgments, not their present reality. Beginner's Love asks: Can I meet this person today without my usual filters? Can I be genuinely curious about who they are right now? This practice is surprisingly challenging—it requires releasing the safety of our preferences, which function as armor. Yet it opens remarkable possibilities. When we release our narratives, people become genuinely available to connection. They sense being truly seen rather than pre-judged. Over time, Beginner's Love rewires our neural pathways around relationship, making impartiality increasingly natural rather than effortful. This transforms both individual relationships and the larger communities built from them.
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