This post about metta meditation (“lovingkindness” practice) was one of the first short posts I wrote on another blog around 2008 or so in its original version. However, I still have snippets and recall it vividly, so I’m rewriting it, possibly with a bit more “extra” than the original post had.

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 made it challenging to attend residential retreats, so I signed up for this one excitedly. Though my focus was more on Zen sitting meditation, I had my doubts about metta meditation. I had tried it, but on more positive days, I tended to view it like posting an affirmation on the mirror. On worse days, when I didn’t have much loving kindness 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 a set of phrases, which can vary slightly. Choose your own; whichever 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)!”

Fortunately, there aren’t limits to lovingkindness; a tiny puppy can soak up many good vibes and well-wishes, and we didn’t end up in Dharma combat. Yes, I know this is NOT what Dharma Combat is before you post comments lecturing me! I just wanted to use the term here. I’m sure she was sending out similar thoughts to mine:

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 sometimes tried 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 a practice commonly associated with 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 tough 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 take particular actions. However, ultimately, I think that compassion and lovingkindness result from any practice that helps us see others as ourselves and allows us to feel interconnected, rather than separate.