Mary Brantley - The Gift of Loving-Kindness: 100 Meditations on Compassion, Generosity, and Forgiveness

Loving-kindness means great friendliness to self and others. Loving-kindness meditation, which fosters the growth and development of this quality of being, is easy to learn. Practicing loving-kindness sheds light on our own innate goodness. Kindness and compassion are qualities that live within all of us. You dont buy them or own themyou live them. Loving-kindness practice helps develop positive feelings and lets us embrace all aspects of ourselves and others unconditionally. It fosters a self-discovery that teaches us how to be a true friend to ourselves and others, and shows us how to meet our inner critic with love instead of hate.

The simplest explanation of loving-kindness meditation is that you repeat a series of phrases aimed at yourself, a loved one, a person you feel neutral about, a difficult person, and, finally, all living things, with the intention of generating great friendliness for yourself and others. For example, you might direct the following loving-kindness phrases toward yourself:

May I be happy.

May I be healthy.

May I be peaceful.

May I be safe.

Of course, theres more to it than that, and in the following pages well explain the intricacies of this meditation practice.

In Loving-Kindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness (Shambhala, 1995), Sharon Salzberg writes that by practicing loving-kindness we learn to cultivate the goodmeaning we discover the incredible power of love present within each of us. She goes on to say that in order to access this power, we must overcome our limited view of our own potential and rediscover a more expansive view of what is possible for us.

Salzberg believes this can be achieved and sustained through spiritual practice. This book is an invitation to practice that kindness toward yourself and others.

Loving-kindness meditation as we present it is not only a technique, its also a way to approach life. It can help you break mental habits of meanness and self-judgment, and it allows your mind to rest from the everyday push and pull of the past and the future. This practice has the potential to make you feel safe and at ease inside your own skin.

At times, life may be stressful, relationships difficult, or health worrisome. Loving-kindness gives you a way to have a different relationship to fears from within and threats from outside. The most inspiring aspect of this practice is how it reveals that you already harbor a place of peace and great strength within. You just have to wake it up. The exercises in this book will help you do that.

Loving-kindness is all-inclusive; it leaves no one out of your heart. Greatness of heart is a feeling we can all cultivate. Loving-kindness meditation is a road map for how to be in the world and how to experience inner peace and happiness.

Loving-kindness meditation, sometimes called metta, or maitri, meditation, is an ancient practice that comes from the teachings of the Buddha. It is said that the Buddha first taught this meditation as an antidote to fear. According to legend, he was in a forest with a group of monks, and sent them off to meditate. The forest was full of tree spirits who resented the monks coming into their territory. When night fell, the tree spirits scared the monks by making loud noises, creating bad smells, and appearing as ghoulish figures. The monks ran back to the Buddha asking to be sent someplace else to meditate.