week 1: metta meditation for hard times
One of the challenges that many beginners (and seasoned practitioners!) find in meditation is the volume of thoughts that come up when we try to sit still without distraction. So - we're not going to do nothing to start out. You'll practice a metta, or lovingkindness meditation, where instead of trying to focus on your breath or sound, we try to focus on repeated phrases that evoke a sense of warm-heartedness towards ourselves and others. It takes practice, but the phrases provide structure to keep going back to.
I wanted to share you with you a simple one that I've used for a few years, and one that I wrote a few weeks ago that feels a little more in tune with everything going on right now, that I adapted from Anna Guest-Jelley, a founder of a body-positive yoga school called Curvy Yoga. They both follow a general structure - in the first cycle, we send lovingkindness towards ourselves; next, towards someone else (a stranger, a friend...if you're up for a challenge, someone you're at odds with); then, towards all beings.
Find a quiet place to sit or lie down. You can say each phrase aloud, or silently in your mind. It's ok if you forget the words - maybe you'll create phrases that feel more meaningful to you. You can focus on just one stanza, repeating the lines a few times, or move through them at your own pace.
- A familiar version:
May I be happy
May I be safe
May I be at peace
May I live with ease
May you be happy
May you be safe
May you be at peace
May you live with ease
May all beings be happy
May all beings be safe
May all beings be at peace
May all beings live with ease
...and the more recent one I've been using:
May I greet myself with gentleness
May I soften when life invites me to harden
May I pause to find perspective
May I trust my own resilience
May you greet yourself with gentleness
May you soften when life invites you to harden
May you pause to find perspective
May you trust your own resilience
May we greet each other with gentleness
May we soften when life invites us to harden
May we pause to find perspective
May we trust our shared resilience
///