May All Beings in All Directions…
It’s my turn to bring something to read for the Sunday Morning Sangha this coming weekend, so I’ve been rummaging through my stuff and came across this passage in one of my all-time favorite dharma books, Mindfulness in Plain English, by Bhante Gunaratana:
“Without loving friendliness, our practice of mindfulness will never successfully break through our craving and rigid sense of self. Mindfulness, in turn, is a necessary basis for developing loving friendliness. The two are always developed together…..
“At the beginning of a meditation session, say the following sentences to yourself:
“May my mind be filled with the thoughts of loving friendliness, compassion, appreciative joy, and equanimity. May I be generous. May I be gentle. May I be relaxed. May I be happy and peaceful. May I be healthy. My my heart become soft. May my words be pleasing to others. May my actions be kind….
“Develop this feeling. Be full of kindness toward yourself. Accept yourself just as you are. Make peace with your shortcomings. Embrace even your weaknesses. Be gentle and forgiving with yourself as you are at this very moment…..
“Let the power of loving friendliness saturate your entire body and mind. Relax in its warmth and radiance. Expand this feeling to your loved ones, to people you don’t know or feel neutral about–and even to your adversaries…
“May all beings in all directions, all around the universe, have good hearts. Let them be happy, let them have good fortune, let them be kind, let them have good and caring friends. May all beings everywhere be filled with the feeling of loving friendliness–abundant, exalted and measureless. May they be free from enmity, free from affliction and anxiety. May they live happily.”
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(image by Fulvio Roiter, from Carnaval de Venise)