Let us begin by just sitting quietly here.
Let's take a few moments to bring the mind and body into this one place.
The body is always present but often the mind is elsewhere.
Now we are bringing the mind into the present.
We are bringing the mind home.
In this time,
In this place,
In this moment.
We can bring the mind and body together by various means.
One means is our breath.
So let us take one deep breath in and out.
Bringing the mind and body together.
Allow the bell to bring you into silence.
Just take a few moments now to reflect on why we are here today.
Why are you practicing today?
Pause to remember that today we are encouraging ourselves to develop loving hearts within us.
Now we might also have some sense of how wonderful it would be if all our hearts were filled with love and concern rather than being caught up in prejudice,
In aggression or in negativity.
This day let your heart be full of compassion and love.
Compassion is a component of love.
Come means together with.
Compassion means suffering.
So today,
While we are cultivating compassion,
We are transforming suffering.
John O'Donoghue in his book Blessings writes,
May there be kindness in your gaze as you look within.
That is what we are cultivating here today.
Kindness in our gaze as we look within.
Every religion has compassion as the basis of its beliefs or as one of its strongest beliefs.
To awaken feelings of compassion within us,
Let us bring to mind somebody who embodies love and compassion.
Somebody who inspires us or has inspired us.
If we belong to the Christian tradition,
We might bring to mind Jesus,
Jesus who poured out his life in love and compassion.
Or we may bring to mind one of the saints or mystics who inspire us.
If we relate to the Buddhist tradition,
We might want to bring to mind the Buddha as embodying love.
Or if you wish,
You may bring to mind somebody who belongs to some other religion.
Or if you don't relate to any religious tradition,
We can imagine ourselves surrounded by light,
The light of unconditional love.
Now let us imagine this person who embodies love standing in front of us,
Radiating light and love towards us,
Completely surrounding us with love.
You can consider this love entering into you,
Filling you with love,
Entering your heart area.
Imagine this love that is radiating towards you,
Evoking in you a feeling of love and compassion.
Let yourself be loved.
We all have an infinite capacity for love,
For compassion.
We have a boundless capacity within us.
The guard of love is at the center of our being.
What we need to do is to cultivate and awaken ourselves to this love.
One way of awakening this love is to bring to mind somebody who has shown compassion towards us already,
Someone who loved us unconditionally.
Bring to mind what that felt like and what it feels like now as you recall that unconditional love,
Being loved with great compassion.
Allow that love that you experienced to evoke feelings of compassion and love in you,
Compassion towards yourself and other people.
Give yourself time.
When we bring this situation to mind,
When we reflect on it,
What we are doing is aligning the mind.
When we intentionally remember compassion,
It is not something new.
We all have goodness in us already.
We all have kindness and compassion in us already.
We have a huge capacity for love and compassion.
That capacity is placed in us by God.
Now when we are reflecting on it,
We are aligning the mind.
We are setting the mind in that direction.
That is what we are doing today.
So often we only see what is wrong with ourselves.
We only see the unkind things we did and how we have failed to live up to our expectations and the expectations of others.
Today we are inclining the mind in a particular way,
Changing the mental landscape in ourselves.
And now as an expression of this love within us and as a way of deepening this love,
We wish ourselves more compassion,
More love.
We do this to aspiration,
Through reciting phrases that are aspirations.
Today we are giving more momentum to that love within us because we are giving it more energy,
More time,
More attention.
And as we do,
These qualities grow in us.
And as they grow in us,
We radiate them out further towards other people.
The phrases we use are classical.
You can change the phrases at any time and use different phrases.
It is important that we feel that we can do that,
That we are creative in the way that we use the phrases.
We will start by keeping the phrases simple.
May I be well?
May I have inner happiness?
May I know compassion and love?
May I be at peace?
The particular phrases don't matter.
What is important is that by aspiring to greater compassion we are nourishing the desire as a way of opening our hearts.
It is important to remember that this is not wishful thinking or that we are ignoring reality.
This practice works at the level of intention.
Another way of saying this is that we are opening ourselves up to God's love and grace within us.
Loving ourselves is the foundation of loving others.
We cannot love others if we don't love ourselves.
If we love ourselves,
We cannot not love others.
We need to remind ourselves again and again that we have within us an infinite capacity for love.
And as we nurture this love in ourselves,
We also are appreciating the fact that we are worthy of love.
May I be well?
May I have inner happiness?
May I know compassion and love?
May I grow in wisdom?
May I be at peace?
We might feel unworthy of love and maybe we feel we should be rushing out to love others.
But we can only love others as we love ourselves.
Loving ourselves comes first.
In this practice we are not forcing anything.
We are just planting seeds,
Knowing that they will bear fruit in time.
May I be well?
May I have inner happiness?
May I know compassion and love?
May I grow in wisdom?
May I be at peace?
Now for a moment we consider ourselves happy and well,
Safe and at peace.
Now letting go of ourselves,
We begin to extend our love and compassion out to others.
Maybe we will begin with somebody who has been kind to us,
A friend,
Somebody whom we love,
Somebody that you trust,
Somebody that has your best interest at heart,
Somebody whose company you enjoy,
Somebody who you can go to for advice.
Or it could be somebody a bit more removed,
Somebody who inspires you,
Who supports you.
And allow yourself to want to return that love.
And so you want to wish them well.
May you be well.
May you have inner happiness.
May you know compassion and love.
May you grow in wisdom.
May you be at peace.
Just as I wished my own happiness,
My own well-being,
My own peace of mind,
Now I am asking this for them.
May you be well.
May you have inner happiness.
May you know compassion and love.
May you grow in wisdom.
May you be at peace.
Again as you say these phrases,
You say them from your heart,
Not just from your head.
You say them with heart and feeling.
And as you bring this person to mind,
Maybe you can imagine that they are here with you.
You don't have to imagine them in great detail,
But just get a sense of the person that you have picked and bring them close to you,
Close to your heart.
As you bring them close to you,
Wishing them goodness and compassion and wellness.
May you be well.
May you have inner happiness.
May you know compassion and love.
May you grow in wisdom.
May you be at peace.
Try to keep the sense of this person.
Imagine them sitting here with us.
Or if you know where they are right now,
Imagine them there.
Wish them with all your heart wellness and goodness and compassion and peace.
Maybe your mind says this person is totally happy already.
There is no point in wishing them happiness.
Then you simply say,
May you continue to be well.
May you continue to have inner happiness.
May you be well.
May you have inner happiness.
May you know compassion and love.
May you grow in wisdom.
May you be at peace.
And now consider this person happy and peaceful and loving and at ease.
And now letting go of this person and bringing to mind someone that you feel neutral towards,
That you don't have any strong feelings towards.
It might be somebody that you see in the bank or in the shop or on the train.
Maybe you don't have an opinion on one way or another.
Someone that you feel neutral about.
And they too wish to be happy and well.
So now we expand our love and compassion to include this person.
May you be well.
May you have inner happiness.
May you know compassion and love.
May you grow in wisdom.
May you be at peace.
They too want to be happy.
They too want to be at peace.
You might not have a clear sense of what they look like,
But just in general.
And if you can have a clear sense of them,
Have it,
That will help you.
They're just another human being like yourself.
And you might not know them well.
You might not know their name,
But you wish them wellness and happiness.
So many people have told me that when they developed this practice of sending compassion and love to somebody neutral,
That extraordinary things happen.
Next time they meet them,
There is a sort of acknowledgement or a recognition.
So again we turn to our neutral person and wish them well.
May you be well.
May you have inner happiness.
May you know compassion and love.
May you grow in wisdom.
May you be at peace.
Now we can imagine this neutral person being really happy and well and at peace.
Now we let go of this person and we extend our compassion outward to somebody that we have difficulty with.
Somebody that we have some difficulty with.
Someone who might have had an argument with us or who slightly irritates us.
We do not pick the person that we have the biggest issues with.
What we are doing is developing compassion.
And just as in developing our muscles,
When we go to weight lifting,
We don't start with the heaviest weight.
We start with the light one.
So we don't pick someone that we are very irritated with.
Pick somebody that we have some difficulty with.
We are developing compassion.
This person too wants to be happy.
This person too wants to be at peace.
This person wants compassion and love.
They don't want to have difficulties in their life.
And so we wish them well.
May you too be well.
May you too have inner happiness.
May you too grow in compassion and love.
May you too grow in wisdom.
May you too be at peace.
It doesn't mean this person is going to become our best friend suddenly.
It's just that we hold the intention of wishing this person well.
Just reflect on the fact that this is just another human being who wishes to be happy and at peace.
And we extend our love and compassion to this person.
May you be well.
May you have inner happiness.
May you know compassion and love.
May you grow in wisdom.
May you be at peace.
Feeling compassionate as you say these words from your heart.
Feeling yourself saying,
I forgive you.
Allow the phrases to free you from resentment.
May you be well.
May you have inner happiness.
May you know compassion and love.
May you grow in wisdom.
May you be at peace.
This person might have a whole history of pain and suffering.
See this person is just another person.
Another suffering human being.
And allow the phrases to give you a greater appreciation of them.
May you be well.
May you have inner happiness.
May you know compassion and love.
May you grow in wisdom.
May you be at peace.
And as you reach out with compassion towards them,
You are growing in compassion yourself.
You're developing this practice,
This kindness and compassion in yourself.
This person that you don't find easy may have very good relationships with other people,
Parents,
Family and friends,
People we don't know.
We have a difficulty with them,
So we wish this person well.
And as we reflect on the humanity of this person,
We wish them happiness,
Love and peace.
May you be well.
May you have inner happiness.
May you know compassion and love.
May you grow in wisdom.
May you be at peace.
We don't force anything in this practice.
What we are doing here is sowing the seeds of kindness.
Sowing the seeds of peace and goodness.
We're connecting with our own fundamental goodness and reaching out to others.
Now we take a moment to consider this person happy,
Peaceful and compassionate.
Now we let go of this person.
And we send out compassion and love equally to all those people,
To the first person who had shown compassion to us,
Our friend,
To the neutral person,
To the person we have difficulty with.
And now we extend our compassion out to all of them equally and we include ourselves in this.
May we all be well.
May we all have inner happiness.
May we all know compassion and love.
May we all grow in wisdom.
May we all be at peace.
May each of us be well.
May each of us have inner happiness.
May each of us know compassion and love.
May each of us grow in wisdom.
May each of us be at peace.
May we be safe.
May we all be free from danger.
May we all live with ease and be at peace.
And we now extend our compassion out further to whoever is in the building we are in right now.
May you all be well.
May you all have inner happiness.
May you all know compassion and love.
May you all grow in wisdom.
May you all be at peace.
And now we send the compassion even further to the people in the street,
The community,
To all the people who live in our area.
May you all be well.
May you all have inner happiness.
May you all know compassion and love.
May you all grow in wisdom.
May you all be at peace.
And now we extend it further to everyone living in this country,
North and South.
May we all be well.
May we all have inner happiness.
May we all know compassion and love.
May we all grow in wisdom.
May we all be at peace.
May all of the people be well.
May all of the people have inner happiness.
May all of the people know compassion and love.
May all of the people grow in wisdom.
May all of the people be at peace.
And just imagine this country of ours being happy,
Free from difficulty,
Free from anger,
Free from poverty and injustice.
And now we extend it out to the whole world,
To all the people in the different continents.
May all the people everywhere be well.
May all people everywhere have inner happiness.
May all people everywhere know compassion and love.
May all people everywhere grow in wisdom.
May all people everywhere be at peace.
Whether they are young or old,
Male or female,
Rich or poor,
People of all religious beliefs and of none.
May you all be well.
May you all have inner happiness.
May you all know compassion and love.
May you all grow in wisdom.
May you all be at peace.
And now we include all the beings,
All other creatures,
All living beings,
All animals big and small,
All creatures whether large or small.
May all beings be well.
May all beings without exception live in peace and ease.
May all beings be well.
May all people live in peace,
Dignity and justice.
May all beings be well.
May all people live in harmony,
Peace,
Dignity and justice.
May all those who die today rest in peace.
And in a moment I will sound the bell and you can let go of the phrases or of the memories and just rest with yourself aware of the loving compassion in your heart connected to your deep fundamental goodness and rest in the breath as you breathe in and breathe out.
And when you are ready very gently open your eyes bringing your awareness back into the room appreciating the goodness in yourself and the compassion that you have nurtured in yourself during this practice.
