Inner
Work
For the week of: August 5, 2002
Roving
Eyes
When you see people whom you find sexually attractive, how do you look at
them? Do your eyes offer a kind and generous appreciation of their beauty? Or
does your glance cross the line into lust?
A grasping quality characterizes lust, a desire to take. In our hearts,
we know the difference between appreciation and lust. If the person looks back
at us, we instinctively avert our eyes out of shame at our wrong attitude. Or,
if more deeply lost, we may even glare at them with a kind of greedy aggression.
When simply appreciating the person’s beauty, we can smile freely,
happily, and kindly. But lust leaves us dissatisfied and diminished, further
enmeshing us in the furtive and futile search for lasting satisfaction in
externals. Even in mild forms, a lustful gaze can cause discomfort in the person
toward whom we direct it. Lust considers others and ourselves as mere objects,
as bodies. Appreciation, on the contrary, honors the one who inhabits the body.
For this week notice how you look at people, and the degree to which lust
enters (or escapes) through your eyes. Can you be responsible for your eyes and
what they communicate?
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