This week, I shared a story about a travel, visiting to a new community, a yoga class, and a shirt gone astray. It may sound a bit juicer than it was, but it also could have been a lot juicer than it was, if I’d lost my “ish” like I was tempted to do when the story first began.
The moral of the story was about compassion, seeing the good in others, and recognizing that most things are only about you if you decide they are. It was about sending good vibes even when they may not feel “deserved,” because sending them out has a way of bringing them straight back to the source. That’s you, for the record.
For this weekend’s “no-fail” mindfulness challenge,” we’re gonna send that good will full circle with a “metta” meditation. Sounds weird, but really it’s not. You can find examples of it here and here.
The idea is that you start of simply breathing, and focusing your meditation on wishing yourself nice things. Maybe something like, “May I be happy. May I be peaceful,” and so on…and repeat.
Next step is to move on to wishing the same for someone else – usually starting with someone you care about, who’s easy to send good vibes to.
Finally, you take on the challenge of wishing well towards someone it’s a little tougher to love at the moment. I know it sounds crazy, and why would you do this, but I’m telling you, it’s powerful. Not only do we rarely offer ourselves this type of “loving-kindness,” we’re even less likely to do it for others – especially those who make us uncomfortable.
So, give it a shot. It may be tough, but you can do it. Remember, the effort is the meditation. There is no such thing as doing it “badly”…it is a challenge, after all.
Regardless of what your weekend brings, I wish you well. 🙂
Photo credit: Jason Long
