November 13, 2018 Group Meditation Part 1 of 2

This 31-minute mindfulness meditation was given November 13, 2018 by Freeman at the Boundless Love Project’s Group Meditation. After doing this meditation, we suggest you listen to the talk that followed it, Develop Self-Compassion to Be a Skillful, Effective, and Persistent Activist. This talk is the fifth talk in the series, Being Medicine: How to Heal Yourself and the World.

Self-Compassion Meditation

If you justify treating yourself with cruelty, you will suffer for it, and you will also justify treating others with cruelty. If you learn how to be compassionate with yourself, you will live with more peace and joy, and you will be more compassionate with others.

Meditation Script Intro

We provide this script as reference material for students, and as a helpful aid for meditation teachers who would like to use this meditation with their students.

If you are considering using this meditation script to lead others in meditation, we encourage you to have a bare minimum level of experience and competency in meditation that allows you to be very calm, focused, and mindful while leading the meditation.

As for recommended experience, we suggest having one or more years of daily meditation practice and completing one or more 10-day long meditation retreats.

Self-Compassion Meditation Script - 30 min

We do this practice out of love and compassion for all beings and all life everywhere, including our own.

May we know the peace of accepting the truth of reality as it is.

May we know the security of having our intentions arise from unconditional, boundless love.

May we know the freedom of renunciation which liberates us from greed.

May we know the joy of living skillfully for the benefit and welfare of all beings and all life everywhere.

May all beings and all life everywhere be loving, peaceful, compassionate, and joyful.

Comfortable Posture

Using wise effort, peacefully position yourself in a stable, comfortable posture that allows you to be both energetically aware and relaxed.

Lovingly do your best to remain as still as possible, as this will help concentrate the mind.

If you need to move, do so slowly, calmly, and quietly.

Using Breath to Calm Body and Mind

If possible, slowly breathe through the nose deep into the abdomen.

Allow your breaths to be slow, silent, comfortable, and soothing.

Let Go of Clinging

During this meditation, let go of the need to do, achieve, or accomplish anything. Let go even of the need to do this meditation correctly.

Lovingly do your best to follow the meditation, but also allow and accept whatever arises to simply arise.

Anchor Your Awareness on Your Heart Area

With great kindness, anchor your awareness on your heart area for the duration of this meditation. The heart area is the space in and around your physical heart. Feel whatever sensations you feel in the heart area.

At any time, feel free to place one or both hands on top of your heart, during this meditation. This may help you ground your awareness in the heart area.

Whenever you notice the mind is lost in thought, with great kindness and compassion, gently label it “thinking.” Then lovingly return your awareness to the sensations you feel in the heart area.

Patiently rest your awareness on the sensations of the heart area as I explain the meditation instructions.

Maintaining a Balanced Mind

In this loving-compassion meditation, calmly set an intention to skillfully open your heart to suffering. This takes courage and bravery to do skillfully.

Gently set an intention to have a balanced, spacious, and stable mind. A balanced mind is needed to skillfully open our hearts to suffering.

To maintain a balanced mind, remember that feelings and thoughts are temporary, impersonal, and conditioned visitors to your awareness. It is the nature of feelings and thoughts to lawfully arise and pass away when left on their own.

Peacefully see the impersonal nature of feelings and thoughts. Instead, calmly and gently hold all feelings and thoughts with a balanced, patient, spacious mind.

Use the slogan, “Not me, not mine,” to remind yourself of the impersonal nature of feelings and thoughts when they arise.

Choosing a Beloved Suffering Being

Calmly maintaining your awareness on the sensations in the heart area, bring to mind a living being you love, who is having difficulties.

This could be a cherished friend, family member, mentor, or animal companion who you know is enduring an illness or loss of some kind.

You can either visualize this being or simply have a sense of them in front of you.

Having a sense of whom you have chosen, reflect on the universal truth that all beings, including this one, wants to be free from their suffering.

Blessings for the Beloved Suffering Being

I will say some blessings of compassion. Silently offer these blessings to the being you have chosen. As you silently repeat the phrases, try to connect with the deeper meaning behind the words.

I care about your suffering; I care enough to be close.

Out of love for you, and with a balanced mind, I open my heart to your suffering.

May you be calm, relaxed, and peaceful during challenging circumstances.

May you always treat yourself with gentleness, compassion, and kindness.

May my thoughts, words, and deeds always acknowledge your inherent worth and value.

Mindful Reflection

Feel if your heart is opening and softening. If you feel a sense of compassion within or around you, then settle into that feeling. Grow that feeling so that it fills you and surrounds you.

Continue to send your chosen being compassion using your own words.

If you have a strong felt sense of compassion in your heart space, then let go of the words, and radiate that compassion from your heart directly into theirs as light, color, or energy.

Offering Compassion to Yourself

With love and kindness, let go of the first being. Now we will move on to offering compassion to yourself. Have a sense of yourself, either sitting here, or, if it is easier, envision yourself out in nature, or in any place that makes you feel safe.

Notice in yourself your skillful wish to be free from pain and suffering. This wish connects to you all beings and all life, who also want to be free from pain and suffering.

Offering Compassionate Blessings to Yourself

Now offer yourself some compassion, try to feel the underlying feelings behind the words. I will repeat each phrase several times for you to memorize it, and then you can say it silently to yourself.