It’s good to incorporate the practice of mindfulness and lovingkindness in our everyday life. This means we try to be mindful in everything that we do or for as much of the time as possible, try to watch this mind and watch this body, follow the body movements, notice the sensations that arise and pass away in the body, notice the intentions and thoughts that arise and the state of the mind. Then every now and then we can radiate lovingkindness to all beings by simply thinking and wishing in our mind: “May all beings be happy. May they be free from harm and danger. May they be free from mental suffering. May they be free from physical suffering. May they take care of themselves happily.” It doesn’t take long to mentally recite these lines; it takes a minute or less to repeat a few rounds of these lines.

Developing lovingkindness is simply the radiation of such good wishes. As we fill our mind with such wholesome thoughts and suffuse the world with love, we’ll find a gradual change coming over us. We’ll find that we’ll be happier, get angry less often, and have more goodwill towards others. Eventually the goodwill that we have for others will be translated into words and deeds. How can it be otherwise if we are genuinely cultivating lovingkindness, if we are sincerely wishing well for others?

As we transform ourselves in this way, we’ll find that people also change in their attitude towards us. They become more friendly and well-disposed towards us. Even animals may show their friendliness and heavenly beings, too, it is said, will protect those who are kind and virtuous. As our lovingkindness develops we’ll find that we don’t want to hate anybody, that we don’t subscribe to hatred anymore. No matter what we believe that love is the answer, not hate, not anger. Consequently we’ll be able to forgive easily, we won’t keep or nurse grudges, and we won’t seek revenge.

Other benefits of lovingkindness practice are that we’ll be able to sleep more easily, dream pleasant dreams, can concentrate more easily, and have a radiant complexion. Furthermore, when death comes, he (or she) will have a peaceful death and a good rebirth on account of his having lived with much love and goodwill.

Radiating lovingkindness is a practice strongly recommended by the Buddha. During his time he urged his monks, nuns, and lay disciples to radiate lovingkindness daily and frequently. In Pali, the language in which the early teachings of the Buddha were recorded, the word for lovingkindness is mettà. This word mettà is now often used by Buddhists. We would say practise metta, develop metta, show metta. And we also often sign off our letters with the words, With metta. In addition to lovingkindness, other pseudonyms for metta are love, goodwill, friendliness. But here we should differentiate metta from the normal worldly concept of love which may be mixed up with lust, desire, craving, longing, possessiveness, and attachment. Metta in the Buddhist context is none of these things. It is purely wholesome, a pure goodwill, a sincere wish for the well-being and happiness of others; it is also unconditional in that it does not expect anything back from the recipient of one’s metta. Perhaps the word, metta, should be included in the English dictionary as a kind of love, goodwill, friendliness which is strictly dis-associated from sensual desire, lust, craving, longing, possessiveness, and attachment.

Now there are many ways in which you can radiate metta. As we have said you can do it anywhere and at anytime even when you are doing things, working, eating, shopping, walking on the road, standing in a queue, lying down at night before falling asleep, etc. All you have to do is to radiate thoughts of goodwill to the people around you – anybody and everybody. For example, you may be seeing a doctor – as he is treating you, you can radiate metta to him and the nurse or nurses that may be assisting him. All you have to do is to wish in your mind, ‘May he be happy, May she be happy,” and so on. You can repeat the five lines’ formula we have already mentioned above over and over again in your mind or you can use any words you like, your own wishes, like May he be peaceful, joyful, healthy, wise.

You can radiate good wishes to your parents, grandparents, spouse, children, brothers and sisters, relatives, loved ones, friends, neighbours, teachers, bosses, colleagues, subordinates, workers, etc. You can radiate to persons who are dear and close to you. You can radiate to neutral persons, i.e. persons you hardly know or feel for, such as an acquaintance, a casual friend, or someone you know only by sight. You can radiate to so-called enemies, i.e. if you were to consider anybody as your enemy. Of course, it is better not to have any enemies or to consider anybody as one. In which case you can radiate to persons who may be hostile towards you, who dislike you, or whom you feel hostile or averse towards, whom you dislike. You can radiate to persons you are having a difficult time with, having conflicts with. This could even be your own dear and close ones! Or you can radiate to persons who have had conflicts with you in the past. You can wish them well, that they may be happy and so on. You can even thrown in some forgiveness exercise, by thinking, “I forgive you (i.e. for whatever he or she had done to you), and may you forgive me too (i.e. if you had done anything to hurt the person or if the person had felt hurt by whatever he thought you may have done or not done.)”

And of course, you can wish for yourself, too, “May I be happy. May I be free from harm and danger, may I be free from mental suffering, may I be free from physical suffering, may I take care of myself happily.” Or you can put it in whatever way or words you like. It seems that some times we tend to think badly of ourselves, we tend to berate ourselves, have a low self-esteem, and can even be harsh and unkind to ourselves. And some people even hate themselves! So it may be a good idea to radiate metta to yourself too, to learn how to love yourself, how to accept yourself as you are, warts and all. Somebody (Ashley Brilliant) once said “I may not be perfect but parts of me are excellent!” And this is very true – we may not be perfect but we have some excellent or good qualities, too. And then again, who is perfect? – all of us have our flaws, don’t we? So we shouldn’t be too hard on ourselves, shouldn’t judge ourselves too harshly.

Accepting ourselves as we are, appreciating our own goodness or good qualities and accepting our faults and limitations, does not mean that we will be complacent and not try to improve ourselves. No doubt we will keep trying to improve ourselves, keep trying to change in areas where we feel we ought to change, keep trying to purify our mind and weaken and uproot the mental defilements of greed, anger, aversion, delusion, etc. But as we are trying we should also be patient and love ourselves, too. Just as other people deserve love or goodwill, so do we. Thus, we should forgive ourselves our lapses, remembering the saying, “The glory is not in never failing, but in rising again every time you fall.”

Beside human beings, there are animals, ghosts, asuras (Buddhists believe these are some kind of hot-tempered, violent or aggressive spirit beings), and heavenly beings of which there are two kinds, devas (those dwelling in the sensual plane and enjoying sensual pleasures) and brahmas (those dwelling in the non-sensual plane enjoying a kind of mental bliss that is devoid of sensuality). So we can also radiate metta to all these beings wishing that they may be well and happy. You can even radiate metta to your departed ones* thinking and wishing that may he (or she) wherever he has taken rebirth be happy, be free from harm and danger, and so on.

(Attention Hock Eng: Footnote* In the Visuddhimagga, a manual on meditation, it is stated that one does not radiate metta to a dead person. But in this case we are thinking along the line of wherever that person has been reborn, so we are radiating to that living reborn person and not to a dead being anymore.)

Now in radiating metta there is the formal radiation and the informal one. By formal we mean sitting down, say in the formal meditation posture with folded legs on the floor, and radiating metta intensively for say 5, 10, 15, 20, 30 minutes or even up to an hour. In this case we’ll be repeating those metta lines again and again in our head and generating an intense or fervent wish for the welfare and happiness of all beings or specifically named beings. In this kind of meditation we can gain deep concentration and absorption. We can become very calm, peaceful and tranquil. And a lot of joy and happiness can arise as we develop the skill in radiating and gaining concentration.

The informal radiation is what we have already mentioned above, just making sporadic wishes now and then as you go about your work, as you walk about, as you answer the phone, etc. In this case, the concentration is not so intense but the benefit is still great because you are constantly programming or conditioning your mind to be full of goodwill. It will also bring about the many benefits we have already mentioned above, such as a reduction in or lack of anger and illwill, a smiling or cheerful disposition, and an ability to make friends easily.

So you can do these two kinds of metta meditation – informal and formal. For the formal one you could start off your day with metta radiation as the Buddha himself did. You can sit down in the meditation posture or on a chair if you can’t manage the formal meditation posture, and radiate lovingkindness for as long as you like. Or you can do it in the evening or night before going to bed. Or in the middle of the day or whenever you feel like it, you could close your eyes and radiate lovingkindness, even while seated in a chair in your office or while travelling in a
bus, train, or plane.

Besides lovingkindness please remember the mindfulness practice. Being mindful now and then, as much as possible, of our daily activities, body movements and sensations, thoughts and mental states. As regards mindfulness, there is also the formal mindfulness or insight meditation which is done seated with legs folded on the mat or cushion on the floor. After having seated comfortably one then observes (feel or become aware of) the breath going in and out of the nostrils, or one observes the abdominal rise and fall that occur in unison with the breath, or one observes the sitting and tangible sensations at the back, buttocks, legs, hands, etc. It is not within the scope of this booklet to explain the formal insight meditation procedures and its aim which is to gain calm and tranquility and to see the impermanence, suffering (unsatisfactoriness) and egoless nature of this mind and body. For that you could read books such as Insight Meditation by Joseph Goldstein, the Experience of Insight, also by Goldstein; Essentials of Insight Meditation by Ven. Sujiva, Practical Insight Meditation by Mahasi Sayadaw, The Heart of Buddhist Meditation by Nyanaponika Thera, and The Posture of Meditation (which explains the sitting posture) by Will Johnson.