Loving-Kindness Meditation

Ease your heart with this short prayer.
By Linda Sparrowe

The Dalai Lama once said that anything that is not love is fear. Seeing the primary emotion as fear instead of hatred or anger may help you forgive transgressions a little easier. The following loving-kindness meditation will help with the process of easing your heart.

Sit in a comfortable position. Set the intention to practice this meditation without judgment and with a healthy dose of affection for yourself. Inhaling and exhaling through your heart, visualize a time when you were really happy and experience that feeling now. Recite, silently, the following statements:

May I be filled with loving-kindness;
May I be peaceful;
May I be healthy;
May I be happy.

Repeat the prayer over and over again for several minutes, feeling as though you’re swaddled in loving-kindness. When you feel ready, substitute the name of the person you wish to forgive for the word “I.” Set the intention to wrap this person in the love you now hold in your heart. Don’t worry if this seems impossible at first. Be patient, and ever so gradually, you’ll begin to feel a shift. 

Linda Sparrowe is the author of several books, including A Woman’s Book of Yoga and Health with Patricia Walden. She co-leads yoga and meditation retreats for women with cancer at Shambhala Mountain Center in Colorado and Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in Massachusetts.

Photo (cc) by Fotopedia user Sila Dhamma