USING VARIETY TO “FRESHEN UP” OUR MEDITATION – CHOOSE AN OBJECT YOU CAN RELATE TO

USING VARIETY TO “FRESHEN UP” OUR MEDITATION

CHOOSE AN OBJECT YOU CAN RELATE TO

One person I know didn’t have much empathy towards little animals, nor did she like children. What she did was very innovative. She’d just been planting some small flowers in some pots in her house; so she just imagined a small plant in the earth. Just like the little kitten or the puppy, the plant is also a being that needs care and protection. She put all her motherly instincts, which she didn’t really have towards children, towards that little plant, nurturing it and just imagining it growing. When it was a young seedling, it was just so tender and so easily hurt and broken. It had a long way to go before it was a full fledged flower. She imagined herself nurturing it, protecting it, loving it, caring for it until such time that the little flower burst forth and repaid her kindness with this beautiful smile of a flower in bloom. She really “got off” on that. That was for her the first time that meditation actually seemed to work. It was the first time she wasn’t waiting for me to ring the bell. So this is another way of developing loving-kindness, instead of towards an animal or a human being, towards even a plant. And you can do that.

The point is, as long as you are nurturing this emotion and making it grow, you’re allowed to use your commentary, and it’s good to use it at this point to keep the fire burning. When you put a match to a piece of paper, you’ve got to blow; you’ve got to fan. You’ve got to keep it going. Sometimes you need two or three matches to get it alight. You work until the fire is going, and once loving-kindness is going, always remember to experience the warmth from time to time. So you’re working to get the fire going, but you’re also pausing now and again, to experience the result of your work. And as you see the result of your work, it gives you encouragement.

So you’re just using this imaginary “kindling” as a means to develop loving-kindness, to get it started. As you go along, quite naturally you’ll be aware of the feel of loving-kindness. When the flame starts to take and there’s a fire starting, you can feel its warmth. Loving-kindness when it gets started is a very pleasurable emotion. Once you start to feel its warmth, then you really get into it.

Now let go of the imaginary being, and imagine in its place a real person, someone very close to you emotionally, your best friend maybe. Choose someone to whom you also find it easy to generate and maintain loving-kindness towards. With inner speech say to them: “May you live in happiness. I sincerely wish you joy. I give you my love, without discrimination. You will always have a place in my heart. I truly care for you.” — or similar words of your own design. Use whatever arouses the warm glow of Metta in you heart. Stay with this person. Imagine they are right before you until the Metta glows bright and constant around them.

When the Metta glows bright and constant, let go of the image of that person. Substitute another close acquaintance, creating the feeling of Metta around them using your inner speech in the same way: “May you live in happiness…”

Next substitute a whole group of people, perhaps all of the people who are in the house you are in. Develop the caring glow of Metta around them, all in the same way. “May you all be happy and well…”

See if you can imagine Metta to be a golden radiance coming from a beautiful white lotus flower in the middle of your heart. Allow that radiance of loving-kindness to expand in all directions, embracing more and more living beings, until it becomes boundless, filling up all that you can imagine. “May all living beings, near or far, great or small, be happy and at peace…” Bathe the whole universe in the warmth of the golden light of loving-kindness. Stay there for a while.

Now imagine yourself, as if looking in a mirror at yourself. Say with your inner speech, with full sincerity: “I wish me well. I now give myself the gift of happiness. Too long the door to my heart has been closed to me; now I open it. No matter what I have done, or will ever do, the door to my own love and respect is always open to me. I forgive myself unreservedly. Come home. I now give myself that love which does not judge. I care for this vulnerable being called ‘me’. I embrace all of me with the loving-kindness of Metta…” Invent your own words here to let the warmth of loving-kindness sink deep inside you, to that part which is most frightened. Let it melt all resistance until you are one with Metta, non-limiting loving-kindness, like a mother to her child.

When you feel it is time to conclude, pause for a minute or two to reflect on how you feel inside. Notice the effect that this meditation has had on you. Metta meditation can produce heavenly bliss. Now imagine that golden glow of Metta one more time, originating from the beautiful white lotus in your heart. Gently draw that golden light back into the lotus, leaving the warmth outside. When the glow is a tiny ball of intense light in the centre of the lotus, gently close the petals of the lotus, guarding the seed of Metta within your heart, ready to be released again in your next Metta meditation. Open your eyes and get up slowly.