Foundations of Meditation, Lovingkindness, Tuesday September 9, Notes, Guided Meditation and Transcript

I. Foundations of Meditation: Lovingkindness, Class V 

• Check ins 
• Group activity. Write on the piece of paper about the difficult person and if able, discuss. 

II. The Neutral Person; the person that we are indifferent towards.

• These are the people throughout the day that we pay little or less attention to; Our perception is that they are less interesting, so we lose our mindfulness. We are indifferent towards these people. 
• This is perception without mindfulness. Perception is based on history of emotions, views, beliefs etc 
• Mindfulness: remembering
• We are waking up to how are our preferences keep us blind
• Waking up to the neutral person’s aliveness; all of us share the longing to be seen and loved
• This opening to all is a selfless act of generosity, takes courage

              

III. Guided Neutral Person Meditation Transcript 

• Taking a position of alertness and relaxation
• And an attitude of gentleness and receptivity
• Bringing to mind a situation that is easiest for you to maintain the intention of  metta: the gladdening experience, the benefactor, or the friend
• Then bringing to mind someone who is not a strong likable or dislikable person for you, they are just easy to not attend to: could be someone you see infrequently 
• Within this gentleness, understanding that this person has all of the longings for love and attention that we do. Wishing them well: May you be safe and well; May you be peaceful, amy you live in ease and kindness
• If you become bored, recognize this is the same suffering that goes with indifference toward this person. You may consider metta towards yourself 

IV. The difficult person 

• We need to recognize that we are probably someone else’s difficult person. We all hurt others, ourselves and the earth. When we see someone as difficult, we see this through perception and perhaps a host of emotions, often fear, anger, hurt or guilt.
• Metta not about changing someone: more about how we are changing how we relate to someone and then the relationship may change  
• We sometimes experience this suffering of aversion as blaming, either outwardly or inwardly. We are actually angry at people’s anger, not necessarily the difficult person.
• Anger and guilt are disconnecting: no love there; we are usually in absorbed into the sense of self; fixated, deluded, tunnel vision, revenge and harm 
• Critical to understand this aversion as suffering; we have lost the present moment, we are fabricating separation between me and the other, we are unable to recognize that
• these thoughts and emotions are impermanent, the thoughts and emotions are in a state of flux. Not personal, not permanent and not perfect: Three characteristics. Of existence. 
• Our sitting practice helps us to see that the solidity of anger is actually anger and a host of other other emotions such as hurt and impatience. Just learning to just “sit with” these emotions we can see how they shift in the body. 
• We can ask ourselves :”What is Our Struggle?” “Why are We Struggling?”
•  We use metta if we are aversive to ourselves. The metta phrases can break the trance of “us and  the other.”  With issues of the past, can we bring kindness to the memories and emotions associated with the memories?
• Inwardly, this guilt is something we hang onto, we identify with some shortcoming, and obsessive over this.. This is toxic. 
• Remorse is more healthy. We remember our infraction, do not obsessive at the information, yet use the incident as future corrective behavior. 
• We may need to learn to forgive ourselves. 
• On the living level, we decide how close we wish to be with them; We also need to say no to others yet do that with the intention of metta  
• So with the difficult person, we learn to protect ourselves through understanding with wisdom, and opening ourselves with the intention of metta towards our fear and aversion, then metta towards the difficult person.  
• We need to work with these unpleasant aversive states because if we allow for action the consequences can be devastating. 
• “Our friends Show us what we can do; Our enemies show us what we must do” Goethe 

V. Guided Meditation,  Metta for the Difficult Person

• When we practice metta on a difficult person, it is important to start with someone where there is mild annoyance or irritation.  Certainly not a person who is a perpetrator in your life. The practice of metta is to develop the energy of kindness with gladdening experiences, benefactors, friends, oneself, the neutral people, then the difficult person.
• Finding a meditative posture that is relaxed, yet alert. Finding a posture that gives you a balanced and erect posture.contemplating 
•  Contemplating an intention for your meditative practice period. 
• Taking three long inhalations and exhalations. Give a little more on the exhalations to let go of any tension in the body. 
• Attending to the area beneath the sternum. Noticing the expansion and contraction of the sternum. Feeling the effect of the breath on the area beneath the sternum. 
• Reflecting on a situation that is easy to activate the intention of metta:an experience of connection with another person, a person who is an inspiration or a friend.
• Now you can wish that person well: May you be safe and well (pause;) May you be peaceful (pause;) May you live in ease and in kindness (pause.)
• And having the intention of metta on yourself: May I be safe and well (pause;) May I be peaceful (Pause;) May I live in ease and in kindness (Pause.)

• And wishing the space between you and that other well: May we be safe and well (pause;) May we  be peaceful (Pause;) May we live in ease and in kindness (Pause.) 
• Now consider a person the you have some challenging feelings with.  If you fall into a narrative and difficult emotions, practice metta on yourself. You can do this by using the metta phrases or bring a gentle attention to that part of the suffering is manifesting. 
• As you regain your presence, Take some time to contemplate that this person is more than just a person who has caused you difficulty. Like you, they have suffering, dreams, values, emotions, thoughts and there is  probably a person who loves them. They were once children. 

• May you be self and well (pause;) May you be peaceful (pause;) May you live in ease and in kindness (pause.)

• Finding the emotions arising that are challenging, considering turning the intention of metta on yourself. Exploring the edges of the discomfort: 

• May I be safe and well in the midst of this (Pause;) May I be peaceful in the midst of this (Pause;) May I live with ease and with kindness in the midst of this (Pause.)  

• Understanding that the person that you directing the intention of metta towards is also suffering. 
• Being patient with yourself if you are having challenges with directing the intention of metta towards this difficult person

Difficult people

Am I one of them?
Seeing, through shades, solo paradigm;
All must be questioned,
No-one immune
From suspect and doubt,
All but s/he out of tune.

Difficult people
Who get up your nose,
Creating disturbance where one seeks repose.
Each must be critiqued,
Some torn to shred,
In relentless pursuit
Of ‘last words’ to be said.

Difficult people,
Are they not sane,
Or suffering complaints of persona or brain,
Delusional grandeur,
Or insufferable phlegm?
Difficult people,
Am I one of them? 

Richmal Byrne

 

One summer I was house-sitting and animal-sitting for my friend Patty. Actually it was the first time I had done this for her. We were new friends and she asked me to stay at her home and watch her cat Cobbie for the weekend while she was away. Everything went fine the first day. On the second morning I couldn’t find Cobbie. I looked around but she was nowhere in sight. I have to say that I didn’t really worry, because Patty had told me that sometimes Cobbie stays out all night but finds her way home later in the day.

Well, Patty came home early and approached me with tears in her eyes. As she neared the driveway she saw Cobbie dead in the street. “Oh my God!” I said. And I went over and over my actions asking myself if I had been negligent, if I had been unconcerned, if I had understood Patty’s instructions correctly. I asked myself, “What did I do wrong? How could Cobbie have died?” In my mind I kept reviewing the events of the two days trying to figure out what I had done wrong. This is fine to do once, but I was obsessing. Patty was doing the same kind of thing. Had she instructed me correctly? Was it her fault that Cobbie had died?

Suddenly we caught each other’s eye and simulta­neously realized what we were doing. We both just cried, “Cobbie’s dead!” Our hearts knew the simple truth. But our minds resisted the pain of that truth and kept trying to find things to go to—doing everything they could do to avoid feeling the pain of suffering and death. It was as if we thought we could have done something to prevent the truth of death. When we realized what we were doing, that was it. That was the end of it. Patty and I opened to the pain of losing Cobbie instead of moving away from it.

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