In the Metta Bhavana practice we are able to develop positive
emotion by enriching the emotional quality of our awareness and
attitudes. One can think about it as another mindfulness
practice: the mindfulness of emotions.
The word metta means ‘friendliness’ or loving kindness.
The word bhavana means ‘development’. Fully developed, metta is
an intense emotion. We shouldn’t expect to be able to ‘generate’
metta just by the strength of our will to feel it. We need to
build up the qualities of metta in ourselves gradually, like
planting seeds of goodwill and empathy: this is bhavana.
When done regularly the Metta Bhavana helps us develop a
propensity for well-wishing and kindness in our daily life. The
Metta Bhavana helps us gradually erode selfishness and
self-centredness and can profoundly alter our experience of
ordinary day-to-day life.
For those of us in chronic pain it can be especially beneficial
in several ways. Frequently people with chronic pain/ill health
understandably experience negativity and depression. We can
transform this aspect of our condition by:
Learning
to be more positive in response to our circumstances.
Learning
to broaden out our awareness to be more aware of others. Pain
by its nature tends to make us feel withdrawn and self-centred
- the metta bhavana practice can help to counter this
tendency.
Learning
to choose how we respond emotionally to our experience of
pain, and indeed life generally, rather than being driven by
ingrained knee-jerk reactions.
On the
realisation that all humans suffer in one way or another, we
can turn our experience of pain into empathy for others,
rather than feeling isolated as if in a prison.
THE PRACTICE
1st stage: We begin by dwelling upon any positive feelings we
have for ourselves, on many aspects of positively caring for
ourselves, on our own positive qualities.
We might try calling to mind the positive efforts we are making
as we sit here in meditation. This is a very good way of getting
in touch with our own positive intentions and actions. Here we
are taking the time and making the effort to meditate as a means
of helping ourselves and changing our attitudes to our chronic
pain. Dwell on this and appreciate your own genuine and
courageous efforts in the present moment.
Alternatively we might use our imagination to help positive
feelings to emerge. We may simply say some phrases to ourselves
which express metta such as: “may I be well in myself”, “may I
be happy”, “may I be free from reactive suffering” and “may I
make progress and have a meaningful life”. We continue saying
the phrases silently to ourselves and then let them have space
to work, let the feeling of happiness and emotion grow from
them.
NB: For those with chronic pain/illness it is obviously
meaningless to say “may I be well” in a literal sense, and so we
can say “may I be well in myself” - this is stressing the aspect
of inner well-being, even if we are not physically well. It is
worth remembering that we can experience a sense of emotional,
even spiritual, health even when very ill in the body.
Likewise we need to be clear what we mean if we say “May I be
free from reactive suffering”. If we are unwell then there will
inevitably be physical suffering present, but we can learn to
lessen what we call the ‘reactive suffering’ that we habitually
layer on top of this basic physical experience: emotions such as
tension, anger, grief etc. It is this attitude of wanting to
find ways to gradually lessen these aspects of emotional and
mental suffering that we are pointing to when we say this
phrase.
Other methods we can use to develop metta include such things as
recalling times when we felt contented, fulfilled, in touch with
what delights us, felt care for ourselves. Or we may create
situations which stimulate such feelings such as imagining
sitting by a calm lake, a sunny day etc.....
2nd stage: We choose a good friend, and as we bring them into
the practice, we naturally feel the flow of our inner
friendliness beginning to include our friend. We can use our
imagination to stimulate our feelings, just as in the first
stage. But now we say phrases like “may you be well”, “may you
be happy”, “may you be free from suffering” and “may you make
progress and have a meaningful life”. Or we can see our friend
when he or she was truly happy, picture them in a pleasing
setting.
We remind ourselves that our friend is a human being just as we
are; that they have hopes and dreams, regrets and fears just
like us. We might wonder what it is to be them and imaginatively
identify with them. We cultivate a receptive attitude to our
friends and allow ourselves to be touched by their qualities.
At first we are advised to choose a friend who is alive, of
about the same age as our self, and for whom we don’t have a
strong sexual attraction. This avoids bringing in feelings which
may be mistaken for metta.
3rd stage: We choose a neutral person. This is someone of whom
we are aware, but we don’t really know them personally. We don’t
have any particular liking or disliking for them. It may be
someone we see at the bus stop, or at work, a local shopkeeper
etc..
In this stage we are consciously making an emotional connection
with the person we have chosen, who is essentially a
representative of all the human beings in the world that we
don’t have any real concern for. By imaginatively identifying
with him or her, we open our hearts to them as a living being
just like us. Someone who has hopes and dreams, wants to love
and be loved etc, just like us.
4th stage: We choose someone with whom we have experienced
conflict, someone toward whom we feel a lack of forgiveness, or
anger, or fear. Sometimes this is referred to as an enemy, but
when we are learning the practice it is best to start with
someone with whom the difficulty is relatively mild. We can try
to see beyond the present disharmony and that this difficult
person too wishes to be happy, to experience a positive state of
being.
5th stage: Staying in touch with the overall momentum of metta
we feel, we bring together ourselves, our friend, the neutral
person and our enemy. We feel the same wish for happiness etc.
in each of us. We feel the same goodwill towards all four people
without bias or prejudice. We feel in touch with a sense of
common humanity and a deep sense of connectedness. The barriers
between ourselves and others start to feel less rigid and hard.
We now begin to bring the wider and wider perspective of life
around us into the practice. We think of others immediately
around us. We look beyond to people living in the vicinity, in
the city, in the county, in the country.......think of people
everywhere, wishing them well, identifying their happiness with
ours....feeling our sense of common humanity...we extend to all
the continents, think of everyone in the world with whom we
share our life....all life everywhere.
HOW TO ASSESS HONESTLY WHERE YOU ARE STARTING FROM EACH
TIME YOU DO THE METTA BHAVANA PRACTICE.
- Acknowledge honestly how you feel without judgement.
- If there are positive elements present, dwell on them, let
them grow and expand, develop and strengthen.
- If you feel blank, introduce thoughts and creative ideas and
wait for a response, then ‘fan’ it.
- If you feel negative or confused, sit honestly with your
experience without denial or indulgence. Bring a kindly
awareness to bear on your experience, feeling sympathy for
yourself. You may choose to introduce a positive element and see
what happens, keeping a gentle, sympathetic attitude.
METHODS TO HELP DEVELOP METTA
Recall the efforts you are making in the act of meditating.
Contact the sense of positive effort and intention that has made
you put the time aside to sit here quietly and do the metta
bhavana. Reflect on the courage and creativity it takes to want
to come to grips with, and transform, one’s own emotional
responses to life.
Use the 4 traditional phrases:
May I/you be well (in myself)
" "
" happy
" "
" free from (reactive) suffering
" "
" progress and have a meaningful life
Keep dropping in the phrases silently to yourself without
becoming mechanical, staying emotionally engaged with the
meaning of the words.
Ask questions to connect more deeply with others in the
practice such as: “What are they going through?”, “What sort of
person are they?”, “What is it like to be them?”. Imaginatively
try to connect and identify with them.
Use memory - recall happy times, beautiful places etc. Guard
against fantasising and distraction. Just use memory as a way to
stimulate the emotion.
Remember a time when you felt very loved (non-sexually) and
feel that love for oneself in the first stage. Imagine others
feeling this sort of love in the other stages.
Physically relax the body as you meditate and find pleasure in
this.
Imagine the sun in one’s own and others’ hearts
- creating a
sense of space, warmth and radiance.
Imagine a flower in one’s own and others’ hearts, gradually
blooming.
Imagine the other people looking happy, take them to a
beautiful place.
Imagine sharing the warmth of a fire.
Imagine giving gifts.
Bring to mind people’s good and special qualities.
