This post about metta meditation (“lovingkindness” practice) was one of the first short posts I wrote on the blog DukkhaGirl around 2008 or so. I no longer can find the original version, but still have snippets and recall it vividly, so I’m rewriting it, possibly with a bit “extra” than the original post had.
Table of Contents
The Essay
Sharon Salzburg, a well-known Vipassana teacher, was coming to town to hold a weekend non-residential retreat on metta meditation, also known as lovingkindness practice.
At the time, working and parenting precluded going to residential retreats, so I excitedly signed up for this one, though my own focus was more on Zen sitting meditation, and I had my doubts about metta meditation. I had tried it, but I tended, on more positive days, to view it like posting an affirmation on the mirror. On worse days, when I didn’t have a whole lotta lovingkindness in me, I considered that maybe it was a way of lying to myself.
In metta meditation, as I had read and as I recall Salzburg explaining, we generate feelings of goodwill toward others. Usually, this consists of some set phrases, which can vary somewhat. Choose your own which works for you, but, in general, they’re along the lines of:
May you be happy.
May you be free from suffering.
May you be well.
May you live with ease.
You repeat these, generating feelings of lovingkindness toward someone.
Salzburg stressed that we should start with an easier target — someone easy to love, such as a child. Unfortunately, extending lovingkindness towards ourselves is the most challenging task of all.
After some practice periods, she sent us outside with the instruction to walk slowly and mindfully and find someone to practice our lovingkindness meditation on.
Salzburg’s retreat was being held at a center in a city neighborhood. I imagined it might seem strange to suddenly have a bunch of slow, silent shufflers around the neighborhood, a Zen zombie invasion.
After a slow search, my eyes lit upon a man walking a small Boston terrier puppy. The perfect metta target! What easier lovingkindness target could there be?
My eyes then locked with a fellow retreat participant. She also obviously wanted to claim this puppy as her lovingkindness object! My overactive imagination descended into superhero/villain mode, imagining dialogue like: “The puppy is mine!” “No, DukkhaGirl! He is my metta target! Mine alone (evil laughter)!”
But fortunately, there aren’t limits to lovingkindness; a tiny puppy can soak up a lot of good vibes and well-wishes, and we didn’t end up in dharma combat. 1 I’m sure she was sending out similar thoughts as me:
May this puppy be well
May this adorable puppy experience joy
May this puppy live with ease...
…and so forth.
However, I’m unsure what his owner thought of a couple of women shuffling along slowly and silently behind him. Perhaps he didn’t mind.
After the retreat, I did go on, sometimes, to try metta practice. The good news is that it improved somewhat. I can now practice lovingkindness towards bunnies and kittens.
My thoughts on metta meditation
I thought that, along with this essay, I’d post a bit more about metta practice. Now, as then, my emphasis is more on sitting practice and mindfulness during everyday activities—though I cannot say that I’m “good” at it!
Metta meditation is generally a practice of Vipassana Buddhism. At the Zen center where I sit now, it’s never discussed.
But what are my own opinions of metta practice now? Is it a form of lying to myself?
I think metta meditation can be beneficial. I can (sometimes) generate feelings of compassion toward people, even when I’m angry. And sometimes not. I have a couple of people in my life for whom it’s very difficult for me to generate feelings of lovingkindness even though I can try to empathize and imagine how situations may appear from their perspective and what led them to particular actions. However, ultimately, I think that compassion and lovingkindness are a result of any practice that helps us see others as ourselves and allows us to feel interconnected instead of separate.
You can likely find other posts like this under the meditation and mindfulness tag.
Footnotes
- Hey, I am well aware that this is NOT what dharma combat is, before you start to post comments lecturing me! I just wanted to use the term here.[↩]