Thank you, Thank you….

On New Year’s Day many in our city came together to do our own MedMob…a meditation for the masses by the masses. We have been doing this for three years so far on New Year’s Day when the time is ripe for sending out our metta, or our compassion, concern, and loving kindness. The cold air was fresh and kept us awake and aware. The warmth of other bodies kept us cosy and comfortable, as did our blankets.

The cultivation of loving kindness begins with intentions directed toward ourselves, then to someone we love, and onto a person we know of but may not know well, and then to a person who is of challenge in our life. It is that “person of challenge” (euphemism perhaps for pain in our side) that sometimes gets a chuckle from the crowd and a furrowed brow but it seems we all have this person in our life. They may be a family member who we consistently have trouble seeing eye to eye with or it may be a friend or spouse or child that we recently had a disagreement and they loom large in our mind’s eye.

As I practiced the loving kindness meditation or the Metta Bhavana as it is called in Sanskrit, I could easily draw that person of challenge to mind. I could see them as clearly as if they were right next to me. They were so close in fact that even after I was done sending them and others my compassionate intentions I could still see them even though they were not physically there. I thought I had failed in my work. I had wanted to release the conflicted feelings and bath in the serenity of calmness that comes from letting go. Then something happened. Out of my mouth came the words “Thank you.” Then those words came again and then once more. And as those simple words released I was able to more fully release the loving kindness I wanted and needed to send to this person.

You are a rare soul if you have no one in your life for which you can identify as that person of challenge. But if you do know of this person then regardless of their position in your life, they are a gift in so many ways. They teach you something about life and about yourself. And, when I sent that gratitude from my heart, I also understood more fully what this meditation has taught me. This person—like me, like close friends, like strangers on the street—desire and deserve loving kindness. I dwell in thankfulness.

May you and all living beings be well, be happy, be free from suffering, and may you know peace.