Got Metta?
Note: I’m writing in the first person here, using “I”; this is intentional so as not to push my “shoulds” on you. Know I’m writing for anyone who can relate, and also know, what works for me may not work for you.
May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be healthy. May all beings be at peace. (May all beings live with ease.) Loving-Kindness (Metta) Meditation
The Loving-Kindness (Metta) meditation is by far my favorite. I use the Calm App to run through mine.
I love it because I truly believe it helps me cultivate compassion towards everyone, but most importantly towards myself and towards people who are more difficult in my life.
“They” say we are our own worst critic, and I do believe this to be true for myself. I have spent a lot of time consciously working towards letting go of self-criticism. It’s a massive project and work in progress. There’s a whole section in this meditation directed towards finding compassion and love for ourself. Taking the time to find things I do well reminds me of my progress, of my strengths, and generates warm-and-fuzzies that help me get through the obstacles in my day. For example, when I start to feel really bad about what I can’t do, I try to remember where I started and what I have been able to accomplish so far. This helps me stay out of the “giving up rut” that would otherwise stop me from moving forward.
<aside> Miley Cyrus has a song about this! The Climb is absolutely on my pump-up play list. </aside>
The middle section of the meditation is dedicated to sending these blessings out to people in our lives we love and have affection towards. This part of the meditation brings to my conscious gratitude towards having these people in my life, which sometimes I can lose sight of and take for granted.
The next part of the meditation is more difficult, but incredibly powerful. Part of being an adult is learning to deal with people who cause us… discomfort, shall we call it? This can range from someone who is annoying to someone who has done us traumatic harm. Regardless, there’s a whole section for them in the loving-kindness meditation as well. This one is a process, but I have found in my experience, that taking the time to picture these people while silently reciting the meditation has granted me a little more space around feeling compassion towards those people. It’s helped me remember that they all have their triggers / habits, much like I have mine. It’s not an immediate shift, but with consistent meditation on this, I have found it helps me in some of my most difficult relationships.
Finally, the very last part is to send the blessings of loving-kindness out, without any judgment or limitations, to all beings. It acts as a nice conclusion / wrapper to cultivating compassion towards everyone and everything.
While there’s certainly baggage I bring to this meditation, and I’m sure I’m not the only one, I find the simple blessings remind me we all have our place, we all have our shit, and we’re all just trying to do what we think is right to make this world a better place. It helps me look at the world with slightly less reactivity and a little compassion.
Let’s spread metta, not hate.
