A 10-Minute Loving Kindness Meditation

So as you prepare for this ten minute meditation, I invite you to think about the power you find when you take time to be where you are, with what you have, and to honor that. And so I like to talk about meditation and mindfulness. What we are attempting to do here is not to remove thought, not to clear one's mind, but to change our relationship with our thoughts. It's not about removing yourself from thought, but about shifting the way that you respond to them. So we're going to practice loving kindness, or a meta meditation today.

We'll move through three parts within this meditation, and I'll shift your focus in each one of them. We're going to start by focusing our love and kindness onto our own being, our own life, our own cares and worries and passions and people. And then we'll shift that love and kindness to focus on those people that we share space with, family and friends and coworkers, the people you walk down the street with. And maybe you nod, maybe you divert your eyes, but those people that you come in contact with.

The last part of our meditation today will shift our focus, our love, and our kindness to all beings within the universe. So I invite you right now to take a deep breath in and a deep breath out as you move into this meditation in just a moment. This is not a practice of clearing away your thoughts, of creating space where the mind goes still. But this is time to become observant of how your mind works, of what thoughts present, and, as they do, to give yourself space. You may be the curator of the thought, but you, in your being, in your presence, in your state, you are not the thought.

So I invite you to close your eyes. After you close your eyes now, find yourself in a seat that you would deem as comfortable. Maybe roll out your shoulders. Does it feel good to have a rest for your back? As you shift left and right, and sooner or later find yourself in a space where you go. I can be relatively still here. Begin to focus the love and kindness that you can muster up on you. Begin to say inside your head, may I be happy. May I be healthy. May I be safe and free from all suffering.

May I be happy. May I be healthy. May I be safe and free from all suffering. As you continue to say, may I be happy. May I be healthy. May I be safe and free from all suffering. What does that feel like? To be washed in love and kindness and take this moment to repeat those words, to be in the presence of love and kindness here. Now breathe in and breathe out. And as if you were looking at the world through a telescope, zoom the lens further out. So rather than placing your love and kindness on you now, see that love and kindness expand to cover everybody that you have ever shared space and time and conversation with.

These are the people that you love and know, and the people that you have been in conflict and dissonance with, people who you know so, so well for so, so long. And for people that maybe your eyes or ears have connected with. Just for a moment, begin in your mind to say, may they be happy, may they be healthy. May they be safe and free from all suffering. May they be happy. May they be healthy. May they be safe and free from all suffering. And as these words shift and spin in your mind, what would love and kindness do for these people that you have shared space and time with?

May they be happy, may they be healthy. May they be safe and free from all suffering. For this moment, focus your energy, your love and your kindness here. Now breathe in. And breathe out. Just as your mind and body fluctuate and shift and send sensations and thoughts that vary from moment to moment, so too can your love and kindness shift its placement, its direction. And so, as you zoom out further to encompass every being within this universe, allow your love and kindness to go to those beings.

May all be happy, may all be healthy, may all be safe and free from suffering. May all be happy, may all be healthy, may all be free and safe from suffering. As your mind flutters as if it's rolling through a rolodex to every name and every face, every heart and every breath, separate yourself from the expanse and see the capacity for your love and kindness to touch, to be sent in the direction of all. May all be happy, may all be healthy, may all be free and safe from suffering. Here now, for this moment.

And as you breathe in, and as you breathe out, return your focus to your physical state and presence. Wiggle your fingers and touching your thumb to each finger pad, roll out your wrists. Squeeze each hand, and as you roll out your neck, raise your eyebrows and drop your jaw, and then squeeze your face tight and soften the muscles of your face as you roll out your shoulders. Take your time to open your eyes. The practice of metta, of lovingkindness is not a magical process. It is not to believe that you taking this moment to send love and kindness, that it is going to change and absolve and resolve, resolve anything.

But it's a practice of manualizing your ability to love, to share kindness and compassion, to make a choice, to consciously put these things into the world and when we do that, the focus and the stress and strain that we carry in our own narrative starts to dissipate. So as you look back at this eyes closed experience and as you zoomed out further and further from yourself, perhaps open up your journal right now and consider the things that you focused on, on the people, the passions, the places, and consider your capacity to manualize, to choose, to share love and kindness and maybe over the coming days and see those moments when you can choose within the reactiveness of life to be in a state of love, to be in a state of kindness, and to see how that changes your state and over time, changes the state of those people around you, maybe those people that you never, ever will encounter and come back and share in this meditation again, whenever you need a reminder of your capacity to have the thought, but to not be the thought, to share the love and kindness because you choose to do so within that state.

Freeing yourself, grounding yourself, and returning to that space where you are, where you are with what you have and honoring that. We'll see you next time.