Loving Kindness ~ Steven Levine
Loving Kindness
Traditionally practitioners start with themselves, then a benefactor or spiritual teacher, then people who are easy to love, then a neutral person and finally a difficult person. I typically practice for 10 minutes a day – usually just cultivating loving kindness for myself and then I choose one person with whom I am having some difficulty. This is for my well being.
Formal Loving Kindness Practices can be modified in any one that supports generating feelings of loving kindness inside of your body (may be felt in the heart, chest, toes…)
These are some phrases I am enjoying today:
May I/you be safe, free from internal and external harm.
May I/you be healthy, as much as is possible.
May I/you know peace, as I wish to know peace.
May I/you be happy, free from suffering and the causes of suffering namely the thought that things should somehow be different than they are.
