Clear Vision Trust

LOVING KINDNESS

The Metta Bhavana

The Metta Bhavana is sometimes called the development of universal loving-kindness. It is one of a set of four meditations known as the brahma-viharas, which means something like 'abodes of the gods'. So we could say that the practice of this meditation and its three companion meditations (of which I shall say a little more later) are designed to put us in the same frame of mind as the gods.

I should mention that the Buddhist idea of gods is rather different from the one we are probably used to. To start with, there are quite a lot of them. Furthermore, being a god is not a permanent condition. A human being, according to traditional Buddhist teaching, can become a god by being reborn in a god-realm; this happens if they have been particularly good! But they will not remain a god for ever; at some point they will be reborn in a different realm, of which there are many.

The point about the brahma-vihara meditations is that they help us to experience positive and enjoyable mental states that are equivalent to the mental states of the gods. The Metta Bhavana is the foundation of this set of meditations. The others, which are concerned with the development of compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity, are, in a sense, aspects of this basic practice. So the Metta Bhavana is really the most important of the four, and the place where we need to start.

The Metta Bhavana may seem at first sight very different from the Mindfulness of Breathing, but the two complement each other very well. Even if we prefer one of the meditations to the other, which most people do, we will find that practising the one enriches our experience of the other. In the end, they are both about developing awareness. Let's see if we can get a handle on what is meant by the word metta, and then we will look at the structure of the practice itself.

The Pali word metta is often translated 'universal loving-kindness'. Sometimes it is rendered simply as 'friendliness' or, less often, 'love'. I rather like the least common rendering - 'love'. It has drawbacks in that it usually refers to romantic or sexual feelings, which few of us in our culture need consciously to cultivate. But despite these connotations, for me it has a certain directness and strength that makes it seem appropriate.

Bhavana is another Pali word, and it means 'cultivation' or 'development'. So this meditation is about the cultivation of metta. The idea that we can cultivate some emotions rather than others goes rather against the grain in Western society. I get the impression that most of us think that whilst we may learn to control the expression of our feelings through discipline or strength of character, we are more or less stuck with the basic way we respond to things emotionally. Buddhism does not take this view. The Buddhist view is that whilst our basic emotional attitudes are quite deep-seated, it is within the reach of all of us to change, if we know how. We just have to make a consistent effort.

So this meditation is concerned with the cultivation of positive emotion. More than that, it is about establishing in ourselves a basically positive attitude towards ourselves and others. Whilst we are often aware that our moods change from day to day, or even from hour to hour, we can also probably sense a kind of background emotionality. We all have our ups and downs, but it is clear that different people deal with these inevitable fluctuations in very different ways.

The Metta Bhavana is concerned with giving us a positive emotional foundation or background to our lives. To begin with, our practice of this meditation is in great part a kind of investigation of our emotional life. It is an application of increased awareness, or mindfulness, a sense of clarity, to our emotions. It is not a matter of controlling them. It is a slow process of getting to know ourselves; learning to acknowledge who we really are; then encouraging the more expansive and warmer aspects of ourselves.

I remember very well the first time I heard this meditation taught. I was on my first meditation retreat. At the time I worked as a psychiatric social worker and I tended to see the world in psychological terms. That is, I adhered to the view that we are only able to alter our basic emotional patterns through long and exhaustive therapeutic intervention, and that even then it is more a matter of learning to adjust to those basic emotional patterns than fundamentally transforming them.

When the teacher had introduced the meditation, which he did in a simple straightforward way, I thought 'No, this can't work!' But I was also filled with a sense of excitement: 'Suppose it does work! Can Buddhists have been wrong for 2,500 years?' Well, many years later I can say that no, they were not wrong, although it must be said that the effects of the practice are not necessarily instantaneous. Nor do I find it an easy practice - whereas I took to the Mindfulness of Breathing like a duck to water. However, I do feel it is a wonderful meditation and, perhaps because I have had to work rather harder at it, I have gained great benefit from it. And I am still filled with a sense of excitement whenever I teach this meditation.

This is as good a time as any to underline the fact that meditation is neither a cure-all nor a quick fix. We have spent all our lives - many life-times according to the traditional Buddhist view - acquiring our mental and emotional habits. If we are going to change them significantly it is going to take time and practice. Buddhism is realistic in this way -neither pessimistic nor optimistic, but realistic. And this is one reason I feel it can be trusted. Change is indeed possible, but it requires time and effort.

We are all unique. Who we are is a complex combination of many factors - our biology, our race, our family, the social context of our lives, and so forth. From the point of view of meditation, it does not matter much what weight we give these various factors; they have all played some part in what we have become. The point is that we are a product of conditioning.

This conditioning has been going on not just for this life-time. Whether or not we accept the Buddhist idea of rebirth or re-becoming, it is still true that as human beings we are the product of the whole evolutionary process. And whether or not we accept the full implications of the central Buddhist truth of conditionality, most people would probably accept its general thesis, which is that all phenomena arise in dependence on conditions; everything is the result of a complex set of conditioning factors.

We too are the product of conditions - laid down by our circumstances and the habits of mind we have developed over the years. And we can now go on to change the conditions we set up, if we choose. We are, to the degree that we are aware, responsible for ourselves. It is this gift (and curse) of self-reflective consciousness that defines us as human, and that gives us choice. As long as we remain only dimly self-aware we can avoid having to confront those choices. If on the other hand we want to be more aware, more alive, we have to make those choices; we have to start the long process that leads to liberation.

While in this vein I might as well risk putting you off the whole idea of meditation. If you take up meditation at all seriously, you are introducing into your life a powerful force for change. Some parts of us do not want to change. Change can be frightening, and we can never say with any certainty where it will end. We are therefore, in a sense, inviting conflict. Furthermore, change is not just some kind of head-trip; it has real consequences in the real world, in our world.

We will not be just the same kind of person, but a bit more positive, a bit more aware. Over time we may become quite different, and this will have repercussions. This is a kind of health warning I try to remember to give to people learning meditation. Meditation is an adventure, and the very nature of adventure is uncertainty. After having meditated for a few years people often find that their lives have turned upside-down. I have not, I should say, met anyone who has regretted it - but be warned. Well, I feel I have done my duty as a responsible meditation teacher now, so let's get back to the Metta Bhavana.

In the last chapter we saw that mindfulness is not an emotionally neutral state. It is in itself a clear, bright, and positive mental state. But at the same time we need to address our emotions more directly.

Later, we will be looking at the idea of 'insight' (in the sense of insight into the nature of reality) in some detail. But it is worth mentioning here that this insight -which is the goal of Buddhist practice -is not a dry affair. It is an affair of the heart at least as much as the intellect. What would happen if we suddenly saw everything as it really was? It is rather probable that we would be overwhelmed by the experience.

The problem that confronts us is that we are deluded. And this delusion is not so much intellectual as emotional. It is our emotional need to try to fix ourselves and the world around us. We know in our heads that everything about us, and in us, is in a constant state of flux. But in our hearts we continue to cling desperately to the things we love -or even to the things we hate. We want things to stop changing, we want permanence in our lives. The fact that no such permanence exists anywhere threatens the very core of our sense of ourselves.

So there is little point in being more aware of all this reality if we lack the positive emotional basis from which we can respond to it in a creative and joyful way. In order to take on the fact of impermanence, and therefore rid ourselves of the suffering which comes from clinging to a false view of reality, we have first to cultivate a strong sense of loving-kindness or metta - towards both ourselves and others.

It is this positive emotional base coupled with the clarity of awareness that prepares us for the arising of insight or wisdom. Insight is a deep penetration into reality supported by loving-kindness and mindfulness. This wisdom is not to be found somewhere out there; it cannot be learned. It is a direct experience of ourselves and of our true nature.

"If you speak delusions, everything becomes a delusion,
If you speak the truth, everything becomes the truth.
Outside the truth there is no delusion,
But outside delusion there is no special truth.
Followers of the Buddha's way!
Why do you so earnestly seek the truth in distant places?
Look for delusion and truth in the bottom of your own hearts."

So according to Buddhism there is no special truth to be found outside of oneself, outside of one's own nature. The finding of this truth does not depend on intelligence or exceptional talent of some kind. It is simply a matter of being aware of oneself in a deeper and deeper way. This is all that we need to do. But to be fully aware of anything we must have a real interest in it, we have to want to understand. You could even say we must have a passion to understand. Our emotions have to be involved, we have to have a sense of care, concern, and sympathy.

The basis of metta is this sort of concern towards ourselves. We have to want to be happy! Our happiness has to be based upon love towards ourselves, for if it is dependent upon the love coming to us from others it will sooner or later break down. We have to learn to like ourselves for what we are, not in comparison with others. When we have positive feelings towards ourselves it becomes much easier then to like others; we are not threatened by them, we wish them to be happy as well.

To have sympathy towards ourselves means to be honest - to seek the truth - within a context of understanding and love. We have to be able to recognize our faults and to acknowledge that we make mistakes. We don't just shrug them off and get on with making more; we try to see them clearly and at the same time keep a perspective, recognizing that we are much more than our faults and mistakes, that we also have the capacity to love, to be creative, to give and to change. If we develop metta towards ourselves we will be able to see our failings within a broader context and they will not overwhelm us. The same will be true of our attitude towards others.

The Metta Bhavana is a very simple practice. There is nothing difficult about it. It becomes difficult only when we are looking for something that is not there. If we are trying to work with delusion it will be painful. If we want to feel great compassion when in fact we are fed up and depressed, we are creating a gap which will be filled with frustration and pain.

If, on the other hand, we start from where we are, from feeling fed up, we will feel good that the meditation has helped us to shift those feelings, even if only a little bit. We will experience a sense of change, a sense that we can work with our feelings. In fact, when we start from a position of honesty, we open up the way for real change to take place, and sometimes we will find that this change can be quite dramatic.

The practice is divided into five stages. In each stage we try to direct a feeling of metta towards a different person (or persons, in the case of the last stage).

Stage One

As we have seen, the ability to feel metta towards others is based on, or is dependent on, the ability to feel metta towards ourselves. This is therefore where the practice begins. In this stage we try to cultivate a sense of metta towards ourselves. Sometimes this can feel quite awkward - if we have been brought up to feel that caring for ourselves is selfish.

In fact, if you think of someone you know who is selfish, it is, I think, unlikely that they will strike you as having a deeply loving attitude towards themselves. Selfishness has its roots in a feeling of impoverishment. We feel that everyone else has it better than us; that it's a dog-eat-dog kind of world and we are going to get ours.

Generous people normally seem quite content; they like themselves; they have an inner richness and do not feel depleted by giving to others. Here I am not so much talking about material generosity, which is to some degree dependent on material wealth, and can even be a substitute for real generosity. I am talking about people who make us feel they have time for us, who will go out of their way to be helpful. Generosity is a very important part of the Buddhist path, because it is the outward expression of metta. In this sense it is a kind of barometer of mental health. So to cultivate metta towards oneself is the first step towards being less selfish.

In this practice it is important not to think in terms of imposing metta. It isn't a matter of just overlaying our old emotional patterns with a surface film of loving-kindness. The meditation is working towards making deep changes in those patterns, not covering them up. So it has to be done on the basis of how we really feel, not how we would like to feel or how we think we should feel.

We have already discussed this a little in relation to the body, but it is well worth repeating: we need to be as much in touch with ourselves as we can before we begin the practice. Again, a short body-awareness exercise will help us. However, this does not mean raking around looking for trouble. Let sleeping dogs lie, as the old saying goes; they will awaken when they are ready and we can take them out for a walk then.

So we want to try for an honest, direct experience of how we are at the time we undertake the practice. We want to leave aside ideas about who we are, and concentrate on what we actually experience. Once we feel we're aware of our general state of mind we can begin to think in terms of encouraging metta towards ourselves.

We need to contact a sense of wishing ourselves well, even if we are aware that other feelings are also present. So we begin to work with whatever positive feelings we already have. We are not sitting here like a hanging judge. We have a concern for ourselves as towards a loved friend. We are being open-hearted towards ourselves, and tender. It is with this attitude that we work with what we find in our experience. We begin to nurture what is positive, to give energy to it. We do this by showing an interest in it. No feeling is too small for our interest.

It is as if your child has brought home a painting from school. You do not tell her it is not a very good painting. You can see she is very pleased with it, she has put her heart into it. So you too can see that it is a wonderful painting: it is wonderful because it is a positive expression from her heart.

Any positive feeling we have is wonderful in the same way. It is worth our attention. So we allow ourselves to enjoy it. Anything we can appreciate in our experience of ourselves we should be aware of and encourage in this stage.

A much-used way of doing this is simply to say a few encouraging words towards oneself: 'May I be well, may I be happy, may I be free from suffering, may I make progress.' The point of this is, of course, not just to say the words but to encourage a feeling or emotion of kindness or warmth towards oneself. This approach works well for some people, but there are many other methods we can use, which I will discuss later on.

Stage Two

Now we bring to mind a good friend, someone whose company we enjoy. It is said that it is best to choose someone who is about your own age, who is still living, and of the same sex. To be on the safe side I usually suggest you choose someone of your own sex towards whom you do not have any sexual feelings. These conditions help to keep this stage of the practice as clear-cut as possible, and most of us will more easily and naturally feel an affinity with friends of our own sex.

So we bring to mind this person. Don't spend too long trying to think of exactly the right person - it's not as critical as all that. I normally just say to myself 'a good friend', see who pops up, and go with them - unless it's clear they don't fit in to this section.

Try to hold this person in mind. Some people find visualization easy, so this is a good method to employ to help keep the person in mind. If on the other hand visualization is a bit of a mystery to you, as it is to me, there are plenty of other things you can do to evoke this friend. I find I am good at calling to mind people's voices, and I often listen for, rather than look for, my friend.

You are trying to hold this friend in your awareness, so if you drift off, this is the point of reference to come back to. Once you feel you have established some degree of contact with your friend, you can wish him or her well. Again you might use words, or you might just feel warmth or love flowing towards them. Of course, you can make a conscious effort to stimulate such feelings, but you can't force them, so don't try to do that. Just be open to what is actually happening. These feelings might be strong or faint; you might feel nothing at all, or even quite inappropriate feelings. The important thing is just be aware of what is happening.

If you feel you are completely losing your way, take a deep breath and come back to yourself, then start again. Often this stage will be fairly easy; you have chosen someone you care about, so just bearing them in mind should be enough to set going a flow of warmth towards them.

This is a very important stage of the meditation, as it begins to encourage us to spend time with positive feelings, and allow them time and space to grow. How often do we give ourselves this chance to enjoy our feelings of friendliness, to relish our appreciation of someone else? We tend, for some reason, to indulge negative feelings a lot more often. If you think of someone who has recently upset you, you will find, most probably, that you spend a great deal of mental energy on this person - a lot more than you do on feelings of friendliness.

Having said that, metta is rather more than just wallowing in the special friendships we may have. Metta is not a 'sticky' thing, so the work in this stage involves letting go of the friend, allowing them to be happy for their own sake, not for ours. We have to try to let go of our own expectations of them, our own need for them. This is not necessarily all that easy, so we need to be patient with ourselves.

Stage Three

In this stage we bring to mind a different person, this time someone that we could call a 'neutral' person, someone we have no strong feelings towards, one way or the other. It might be someone we work with but have never really got to know, or it might be someone we often see in our locality; it doesn't matter too much. What we are trying to encourage here is an expansion of our normal emotional range, a broadening of our emotional awareness to include those who do not have a direct impact on our lives.

We are trying to experience the same well-wishing towards this person as we do towards our friend. So we are encouraging the beginnings of a basic reorientation of our whole emotional life; a movement away from an emotionality based in a self-referential attitude towards an attitude that is far more expansive and open. I am sure that at some point in our lives we have all experienced metta from a stranger - an act of friendliness free from any selfish motivation. It might be as simple as a smile, or help when we need it.

A word I often use when describing this stage is solidarity. We are encouraging a feeling of solidarity towards others, not because they have a direct effect on our lives, but simply because they too are alive. We know, if we use a little imagination, that these neutral persons share with us the same range of emotions; they have their hopes and fears, their joys and pains, just as we do, and it is on the basis of this recognition of our shared humanity that we find the desire to wish them well. I hardly need to point out what a different world we would find ourselves in if we all took the time and trouble (perhaps I should say time and pleasure) to cultivate such feelings towards each other.

Stage Four

We now make a move into enemy territory, that is to say, we bring to mind a person who would normally provoke in us rather unfriendly feelings. We bring to mind an enemy, or at least someone we find difficult or irritating. This is a very interesting stage of the meditation to teach, as it tends to provoke strong reactions from people. These range from denying there is anyone they dislike, to honestly stating that they do not want to wish such a person well, as this would seem hypocritical.

To those who say they don't have anyone they dislike in their life I sometimes suggest they bring to mind a member of their family. This normally gets a laugh of recognition. The problem here is that we tend to think that if we are a 'nice' person we shouldn't have such feelings. But it isn't a matter of what we should or shouldn't have; it is just a fact that these feelings are part of our lot as human beings. It is very unlikely that we don't entertain any negative feelings at all towards anyone. It is much more likely that we do not acknowledge these feelings in ourselves because we think they are bad.

This is important, because it takes a lot of emotional energy to hold down these more negative feelings, and while our energy is being employed to do that it is not available to us for more useful things. It is relatively easy to transform energy, but that energy must first be available.

I have worked with many deeply depressed people, and very often one of the first signs that the depression is beginning to lift is an upsurge of anger. This is an extreme example, but the principle holds true in more subtle forms. It is as if these feelings are the crudest expression of our emotional energy. The crude ore has to be extracted before the process of refining it can begin. So don't worry about having these negative feelings - they are the raw material for metta. Nor is there any need to worry if it takes us a little while to free up some of this energy. Once again, don't force it. Trust in the practice.

As for the other extreme, people who frankly admit to strong feelings of hatred or dislike, but do not see why it is in their own interest to work with these feelings - I like to tell them the analogy for hatred in traditional Buddhism. Hatred is likened to picking up a burning log or coal to throw at your enemy; quite possibly you will miss, but you can be sure that you will burn yourself. Hatred is not something we can direct at others without it having a seriously unpleasant effect on ourselves. So even if at first one cannot honestly find an altruistic motive for working with these types of emotions, there is a good enough reason of self-interest to get us going.

However, this is the stage where there may be some risk of falsifying what you actually feel. Do not expect great waves of overwhelming love to flow from your heart. It is very nice if they do, but don't imagine they are the norm. It is more likely that you will drift into revenge fantasies; one moment you're sitting there trying to experience loving-kindness, and the next you have an axe in your hands!

If something like that happens, try to see the humorous side of it. Go easy on yourself; just take a breath, centre yourself, and try again. If it's really too much, pick someone else; maybe you will have to work up to dealing with your bete noire gradually. Even when you see the uselessness of hatred it is still difficult to give it up. According to Buddhism, negative attachment is as strong as, if not stronger than, positive attachment. It is often harder to give up what we hate than what we love, so take it easy.

In this stage it's particularly important to stay in touch with what is going on in your body. Usually, negative feelings, as well as positive ones, have a physical component. This is of great help to us because it gives us another means to work with what is happening. We shall take a closer look at this later, but for now just think about keeping the body relaxed but alert. It's really quite hard to feel anger when you are physically relaxed and open.

Just do your best to wish this person well. You can reflect that there is probably a lot more to this person than the negative aspects you pick up on. You can also bear in mind that - from a Buddhist point of view at least - trying to wish this person well really means wishing their happiness, and in particular their spiritual well-being. If that person were happier, more aware, kinder, would you still find them so difficult?

Note that in this practice we are wishing people well, not kidding ourselves that everyone is really ok, when clearly plenty of people aren't ok. We are simply attempting to break the circle of hatred spawning more hatred.

Stage Five

In the final stage of the meditation we really let ourselves go. We try to apply whatever feelings of metta we have unearthed to all manner of other people, wherever they may be - or, indeed, to all manner of living beings, human and non-human. First of all we bring together the four people we have already included in the meditation, with the thought 'May I feel equal metta for all these people.' This means 'May I feel equally strong metta towards all four people.'

This doesn't mean that we stop having particular friends. It doesn't mean that we stop enjoying the company of some people more than that of others. It's just that when we awaken the faculty of metta within us we find that it's impartial. It's not that it's impersonal, but it goes beyond our personal view of things. It is a response deep within us that is activated by any living being. Almost all of us have it anyway to some degree; at our best we respond naturally to the life in others that we find in ourselves.

So in this stage we are developing the element of non-exclusivity in our metta. We imaginatively expand the range of our metta, gradually taking in all beings; wishing all beings well, wishing all beings freedom from suffering, wishing that all beings may make progress towards true happiness.

You can do this geographically, starting perhaps with those sharing the building you are meditating in, then taking in those living in that street, the locality, the town, the country, the continent, and so on. Or you might do it by first thinking of your friends, then your family, then your acquaintances, and so on. Or you might find another way of expanding outwards.

What is important is that we take in as wide a circle of people as we can. Sometimes this strikes people as rather abstract; we may wonder how we can really extend metta to people we have never met. But if we let go of the limitations we impose on our imagination, we may well find this to be a very powerful experience.

I once saw a short documentary consisting of a number of interviews with people - from many different countries - who have travelled into space. What was remarkable about the film were the similarities in the responses of most of the people interviewed. Nearly all of them said how deeply affected they had been by the experience of seeing the Earth from space. They described in their own ways what might be called an experience of universal metta. Seeing how beautiful and fragile the Earth appeared when seen from space brought forth in these people, some of whom were pretty tough cookies, an overwhelming feeling of love, a feeling of wanting to take care of the Earth, a realization of just how precious life is. Sometimes when I do the Metta Bhavana I imagine what the Earth must look like from so far away.

Approaches to Cultivating Metta

I have said that one way to encourage and sustain a sense of metta in meditation is to use words. This means finding a simple phrase such as 'May I care for myself,' and using this phrase to stimulate a feeling. It does not mean that you sit and repeat in a dull and unreflective way -'May I care for myself - may I care for myself.' We are not attempting a form of self-hypnosis.

If you are going to use a simple phrase to help you develop metta, you will have to give it some weight and feeling. You will also have to give it time to affect you. It's as though you take this idea in the form of words and drop it into your heart. You can actually imagine these words going down from your head into your body, coming to rest in your heart, or lower down still. And you can imagine these words setting up a sympathetic vibration in your body which is the feeling of metta.

If you want words to provoke an experience of metta they must be said with the intention to realize metta. That is the point of them. They suggest an emotional response, so they have to be said with feeling. If you happen to be a lawyer, no doubt you will see that this is rather a circular argument: it is as though we have to have metta in order to say the words with metta in order to produce metta. In a way this is true, but it is also true that there is no absolute division between thoughts, in the sense of words, on the one hand and feelings on the other. If you are sensitive to your words you will find that they always have an emotional component to them. There is no such thing as a completely abstract thought, free from all emotion. Even in the abstract field of pure mathematics, one of the qualities the mathematician looks for, or responds to, in an equation, is its elegance.

For some people words do not work very well in meditation. Even when they try to put warmth into them, the words still come out rather mechanical. If this is your experience after trying the practice a few times, don't just keep plugging away; try a different approach. For example, it might be that a simple image will work to stimulate a feeling of metta - a flower, say, slowly opening in your heart.

Alternatively, you could try using your memory. Remember a time when you were happy, and use this memory to reconnect with your feeling at that time. This can be of great help in the second stage: remember a time when you were in the company of a friend, having a good time or feeling a particularly deep connection with them.

It is also quite possible to base the metta practice in actual physical sensations. Let's say that, during the body meditation, you find yourself relaxing - well, you can encourage this sensation, allowing it to spread and grow. Just being aware of a sense of warmth and life in your hands can be the basis for encouraging metta to arise.

So there are many ways to approach this practice, and you should feel free to experiment. One word of caution: keep it simple. Complications can give rise to distractions - you will drift off into associated ideas or images and lose your basic intention, which is simply the cultivation of loving-kindness.

Now we'll do a led practice so that you get some idea about at least one possible approach to the Metta Bhavana: the development of universal loving-kindness.

The Metta Bhavana: a led practice

Before you start, think of three people you are going to use in the second, third, and fourth stages, so you do not spend the whole time picking and choosing people. Also remember to find a time when you will not be interrupted, and a quiet comfortable place to sit. Read through the practice a couple of times. You don't have to stick to it word for word - just try to get a good sense of it, or have a friend read it out loud.

Begin by taking the time you need to settle into your meditation posture. When you are comfortable, allow your eyes to close. As you close them try to let your face relax. Have a sense of not needing an expression on the face to set against the world or against your own experience - so that there is a feeling of the face being soft and open. If it still feels hard, introduce the ghost of a smile, which will encourage the facial muscles to relax. Try to allow your eyes to become still. You can think of them as soft and round, just resting.

Then take your attention down to your contact with the floor. Have a sense of the ground underneath you, supporting you. Try to let go of the weight of your body, giving it to the ground to support. Begin slowly to experience your body from the ground up.

Imagine your awareness filling your body, perhaps like a warm soft light - penetrating gently into your bones and muscles, relaxing the body as it moves upwards...taking in the feet and the legs...up into the pelvic area...and into the lower back.

Be aware how your body responds to your directed attention, making that attention warm. The practice of loving-kindness begins by addressing ourselves with an attitude of loving-kindness. Take the time you need to contact your physical experience. Do not force your awareness into areas of the body that feel resistant to it, but be aware of that resistance, allowing the surrounding areas to soften and relax.

Draw your attention through your back, across your shoulders, and down your arms into your hands. For a few moments focus your attention on your hands. Check that they are relaxed and that your arms feel comfortable. Bring your attention back up your arms into your neck and up to the base of your skull.

Feel the muscles of your neck release and soften, and have a sense of your head being balanced rather than held. Become aware of the back of your head and then the top of your head. Feel the shape of your skull and allow the scalp to soften. Now return to your face, letting the whole of your face relax a little more...the brow, the cheeks, the mouth, the jaw.

Feel the air against the skin of your face and become aware of your breath entering and leaving the body, finding space inside your body. Allow the breath to be easy and natural. Become aware of your body responding to the breath. Have a sense of your body being alive with the breath.

See if you can feel the movement of your body as the breath comes and goes. Find the movement low down in your belly, allowing the breath to soften the belly from the inside; then in your chest, feeling the whole of the rib-cage gently expanding to accommodate your breath, both at the front and the sides and the back.

Keeping an overall sense of stillness in your body, experience the soft rhythm set up by the breath. As you breathe in, have a sense of your chest opening, your shoulders relaxing. As you breathe out, let go into the breath, expelling any tension that you feel.

Slowly use the breath to help you begin to gather your awareness in your chest, inside your body where you imagine your heart to be. Imagine the breath is creating a connection between your head and your heart. Imagine the in-breath taking awareness down into the area of your heart and the out-breath allowing the feelings of your heart up into awareness.

Just spend a few minutes experiencing the breath as connecting up the head and the heart. Allow the breath to create a sense of spaciousness around your heart area. Allow yourself to experience what you feel, allow your heart to express itself into the space your breath is creating.

Then begin to imagine that the breath is carrying down into your heart a sense of well-wishing towards yourself. This may be a few simple words: 'May I care for myself,' or just your name spoken in your mind with warmth, or it may just be a sense of kindness. Keep it simple, just the intention of well-wishing directed down into your heart, into your body.

Give the words or intention time to settle, Don't rush or push yourself. Give yourself all the time in the world. 'May I be well, may I be happy.' Allow the heart to respond in its own time. Slowly experience your heart space filling with this simple idea. Continue in this way for a few minutes.

Now bring to mind a good friend. Invoke them, or evoke them, in whatever way works for you: with an image of their face, or by remembering their voice, or by remembering the last time you met. Bring them into your awareness.

Experience the warmth in your heart naturally turning towards them. 'May they be happy - may their life be how they would like it to be.' Take your time - not forcing out a feeling, just working with a clear intention to wish them well.

Allow time to experience any response you might have to this intention. Enjoy any positive feelings or thoughts that this intention generates towards your friend. Renew this intention whenever it feels it has been lost, and just keep the friend in mind. @GILL = Keep the practice simple: on the one hand maintain a sense of your friend, on the other develop a simple intention of well-wishing, of loving-kindness, together with an overall awareness of yourself. Continue this for a few minutes.

Allowing your friend to fade away from your attention, bring to mind the neutral person - who like yourself and your friend also wishes to be happy. Try to maintain the same kind intention, the same well-wishing as before, and simply extend it to include this person.

Keep your sense of them as bright and clear as you can, coming back to them if you find your mind moving away. Very gently, look beyond the limited view you have of this person. For once, don't just dismiss them from your mind once you have labelled them. If you like, use your imagination to evoke the individual richness and significance of their life.

May they be well, may they be happy. Don't force anything. Just allow whatever positive feelings you have to reach out to this person. Be sensitive to what is there, rather than trying to create some big feeling. Continue this for a few minutes.

Allowing the neutral person to fade out, bring to mind an enemy. Keep the face relaxed and open. Notice if the body has reacted to the introduction of this person. If you feel yourself tensing in your shoulders or your belly, take a few slightly deeper breaths, and soften your body.

Notice what your mind is doing. Has it got an old story it wants to replay about this person? Try to catch it before it goes off in this way; bring it back to the present and the intention to wish this person well.

Imagine this person well and happy, imagine them relaxed and joyful. See the other side of this person -from the side you find difficult. Try wishing this person well. Say their name and wish them well: 'May they be happy, may they be well.'

Give yourself time to see what that feels like to you. Allow yourself to feel what is happening in your heart; feel your resistance - or feel that you are letting go of old destructive patterns. Imagine what it would be like to let this person be, to wish them well in their life, to lay aside the negative feelings you keep hold of. May they be well. Continue this for a few minutes.

Now bring to mind all four people you have thought of in the meditation: the difficult person, the neutral person, the friend, and yourself. Imagine all of you together, imagine a feeling of metta between you. All of you recognizing one another's desire to be happy and wishing one another well.

Look for a positive response to all four that is the same, that is equal - the same deep response of solidarity with another human being. Now you can begin gently to extend this feeling of well-wishing outwards.

Allow your awareness to move outwards, an awareness imbued with metta. Slowly take in the street, the locality, the district, and so on...just moving outwards. Metta has a natural tendency to expand.

Wish all beings well as they are encountered in your imagination. You can think of all kinds of people, from all kinds of cultures. Try to imagine the tenor of their lives, and identify particularly the aspects we all have in common in some form or another. Again, you may want to listen to their voices in your imagination rather than rely on visual imagination.

Think not only of people you may naturally feel sympathetic towards, but also of the kinds of people towards whom you feel less sympathetic. Include bad people as well as good, criminals as well as victims, people you disapprove of as well as people who are ok. May all beings whatsoever be well, may all beings be happy, may all beings be free from suffering, and may all beings make progress. Continue in this way for a few minutes.

Now slowly bring the awareness back to yourself. Think: just as I wish all beings well, so too may I be well, may I too be free from suffering and may I make progress. Finally, come back to your body sitting on the floor, back to the breath coming and going, back to a sense of the room around you. Then slowly bring the practice to a close. Sit for a minute or two with how you are now feeling.