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Happy Hour: Cultivating kindness for oneself through appreciation for another

What I'd like to offer this evening for our practice reflections is to start practicing together. I'll introduce the theme in the guided meditation, and I'll say a couple words about it afterwards. Let's just begin sitting together, meditating together.

I invite you to settle, to arrive in your body. If you're sitting, let yourself feel a sense of integrity in your posture. If you're sitting in a chair, feel the bottom of your feet, both feet planted on the earth. Feel the softening into your feet, the softening into your sit bones, into your abdomen. Feel the softening of your neck and shoulders, your eyes in their sockets, your forehead. Let the skin be soft, not wrinkled. Let your jaw be loosened.

Let your breath be free, not controlled or constricted, but moving freely however it wants to be, long or short. Let each out-breath settle you, releasing tightness, holding, settling, letting go more deeply with each out-breath.

Nothing needs to happen. Just here, simply here. Being breathed. Releasing, letting go with every exhale. It is so delicious to be present with whatever is here. Not thinking, not analyzing what is here, but just being with it. Breathing with whatever is present in the body.

I'd like to invite you to bring to your heart, invite the presence of someone for whom goodwill and kindness comes easily. You don't have a complicated relationship with them, ideally, and ideally they're alive. It could be a pet, it could be a child, someone easy. Opening them into your heart space. Feeling their presence. Noticing how you feel when you invite them into your sphere of awareness. Does a smile show up? Is there a sense of gladness, a sense of safety, delight, a sense of care, appreciation, love? Notice the shift.

From this felt sense, however subtle it might be, share your goodness, your goodwill, your appreciation for them. It could be without words, without phrases. It could be with the simple phrases of mettā^[1]: I wish you well, I appreciate you, I wish you well. Or with the four more traditional phrases: May you be safe, dear one.

Keeping their image or felt sense, whatever keeps the connection with this being alive for you, keep it up. May you be safe from inner and outer harm. I wish you safety. Although I know absolute safety is not guaranteed in the world, I offer this wish to you as a gift of goodwill. I wish you well. I wish you safety. I wish you happiness. May you be happy. May you be healthy, as much as possible. And may you have ease in your life, take care of yourself happily. May there be ease for you.

Keep it really easy, whatever works, phrases or not. Simple phrases, four phrases: May you be safe. Happy. Healthy. May you have ease. Connecting with their image, their felt sense, to keep the practice bright through the connection.

Now, as you give, as you share your goodwill, cultivate mettā for this dear being. Consider an aspect of this being that you really appreciate, a particular aspect of them. Maybe they're really kind, or generous, or easygoing, or they're a great cook and cook for you with so much love, or anything else. One aspect. Bring that to the forefront as you appreciate them, as you share mettā, share your loving-kindness with them, for them.

Or maybe it is just how they make you feel accepted, safe. Bring that to the forefront and share mettā.

I'd like to invite you to bring yourself in to receiving mettā. As you are giving mettā, sharing it both to this dear being, this easy being, and next to them, yourself. An image of you, a felt sense of yourself. And maybe your dear being and you, in this image, are interacting the way you usually do: taking a walk, sitting, having tea, or whatever it might be. Share mettā for both of them. May both of you—one is your dear being, the other is yourself, an image of you interacting with your friend—may both of you be safe from harm.

Stepping outside of yourself and seeing yourself interacting with your dear being is an aspect of impersonality, cultivating the universality of mettā. May you both, dear beings, be safe. May you be happy. May you be healthy as much as possible. Having a felt sense and image of both of you, these dear beings interacting. May you both have ease.

Safe. Happy. Healthy. Ease. Appreciating that both of these beings are doing their best to show up as well as they possibly can. See yourself in a kind light, just as you see your dear being in a kind light, as a person with goodwill and kindness, ascribing goodness and goodwill.

And you appreciate, you appreciate all of your dear being, your friend, and all of yourself. Seeing the good, making space for what's challenging with kindness, with compassion, maybe even fierce compassion, but still making room for all parts. With goodwill, no part left out.

And as we bring this sitting to a close together, appreciating your own goodness for having shown up, practiced as well as you're able to in this moment in time. Seeing your own goodness, and making room for what's challenging inside and outside. And all of us together, having co-created the space to practice together, to cultivate mettā, kindness, goodwill, generosity of spirit. Sharing this goodness in our hearts with all beings everywhere. Trusting, knowing that our practice isn't just good for us, it doesn't just impact us. It impacts others, our loved ones, our friends, strangers. It reverberates in ways we cannot even imagine through the world. May all beings everywhere, including ourselves, be happy. May all beings, including ourselves, be free.

Thanks, everyone. Thanks for your practice.

Reflections

Just a few words to review what we did this evening. We began with settling in the body with the breath, relaxing, softening in the areas that were tight and needed to be released. And then we invited the breath to be releasing with every out-breath, to settle us more deeply into our heart, into our posture, into the present moment.

Then we invited someone we cared about. We did mettā for them any way that it was easy, then brought to our minds an aspect of them that we really appreciate, we really love, so that our hearts gathered around the goodness, the brightness. And then we invited ourselves as a beloved other in interaction, interacting with our dear being. This is something we haven't explored here in Happy Hour in so many ways. Then wishing well for both of these beings doing their best, interacting, which is just a different way to get to mettā for ourselves. Sometimes mettā for ourselves can be so challenging, so there are many different ways we try to get to it.

Mettā for a dear being, mettā for ourselves through seeing ourselves as a beloved other, and also this way of stepping out of ourselves and seeing ourselves in interaction with someone we care about ties into, as I was mentioning, a sense of universality. That impersonality, not-self^[2]—like, oh yes, just goodwill. It is us here that's considering all of this, and yet there is something tapping into the universality of goodwill that's just available.

I'm going to invite us to transition now to small groups, and then we'll have time for reflections after that when we come out with a recap. Groups of size roughly three, hopefully. The invitation always is, as we connect with other people in the Dharma^[3], with other practitioners in this contemplation, for each person to share a little bit of what it was like for you. There's no right or wrong. You can say, 'I fell asleep' or 'My mind was distracted.' It's okay, it's fine. Or maybe something new came up when you saw yourself in interaction with someone else. Just offering that again as a gift to the Sangha^[4].

Then notice also your intention. Why are you speaking? Is it to be of service to yourself and others, not in a way of self-aggrandizing, but just humbly sharing your insights with others? You can also say 'pass' when your turn comes, and then maybe later when it comes your way you can say something, or not. It's all good. Each person will just say something for a minute or two, and make sure you leave space for the next person, and then it'll come back to you so you can go around a couple times.

No asking questions, no directing other people's experience. Just sharing from your own experience, very simple, and letting others share from theirs. Be kind. Breakout groups are the perfect place to stay embodied and speak from your body, to practice mindfulness of speaking, mindfulness of listening. It's such a beautiful practice. Instead of thinking, 'Okay, it's recess, blah blah blah,' please don't do that. Stay in your bodies. This is a really important practice, so many things can light up.

I'm going to open the breakout rooms and give you a few extra minutes at the end when the timer ends just so that you have a heads up. Here we go. Take care of yourselves, take care of each other. Be kind.

Q&A

The rooms are closed, everybody is back, and we have a few minutes for reflections, questions, comments, or observations. Either from the guided meditation, or from your breakout connection with the Sangha. You can type them in the chat if you like, and if you type them privately to me I will just read your comment or question, not your name. Or you can also raise your Zoom hand. Any reflections you'd like to share, or questions? What was it like? Yes, Pietro, please.

Pietro: Thank you, Nikki. Good evening everyone. That was a very lovely meditation, and very interesting for me was seeing myself in the third person. It's something I haven't experimented with, but it was very powerful, so thank you so much for that.

One thing that we discussed a little bit in our small group was how it's not always easy to find uncomplicated people to direct mettā to. If you've got family, usually there's a lot of love, but it's not always uncomplicated or easy. I was just lucky that for me, it happened that a neutral person today did something really nice to me. So I was able to bring that person in, whom I don't know very well at all, but they did something nice. It was so easy to open the heart. There was nothing between us, really no negativity. It felt like a really great choice. It took a little bit, but at the end, it really opened my heart a lot. I just wanted to share that.

Nikki: Beautiful. Thanks so much for sharing that, Pietro. I appreciate the wisdom that you had to bring in a neutral person for you today—this person that had done something nice to you, so your heart was open. Many times it is skillful to bring in a neutral person if, as you said, with some of the dear people we love, the relationships are complicated. Very skillful. It's beautiful how you brought in a neutral person who had become a dear person in a way through their kindness. To just let the heart be open and explore, "Oh wow, me as a third person being kind, interacting with someone." That can be very onward leading also. I'm glad that lit something up for you. Thank you so much for your practice. Yes, Serena.

Serena: Thank you so much for your teachings. I'm going to ask a question about how to skillfully deal with... oh, I can't even think of the word right now. Maybe Pietro can help me. What was the word I used in our group? It's a type of ill will. Not really resentment... it's less severe than resentment or ill will. Irritation. That's it, that's what it was. Thanks, Pietro.

I felt a lot of irritation during the meditation, and I really didn't feel like I had the capacity at that point in time to handle the irritation. So I basically decided to do something else.

Nikki: So let me ask you... I already have some thoughts, but I wanted to ask you. If you can go back in time and get a sense of what the irritation was. What was the source of it? As well as you can tell. Maybe it's hard to tell, and it was just a feeling of irritation that you came in with, and an irritable mind.

Serena: Yeah, well, I wasn't aware that I was. I'm actually quarantined with COVID right now. It's the first time that I'm aware that I've had COVID in the past three years, and actually, I wound up at the hospital for it. I've been back since yesterday. But what I have noticed is, even at the hospital, I was irritated with this lady who could not get something right. For me, the irritation feels so strong when it comes on that I feel like I'm not able to really get a handle on it at the time. Unless I can just totally turn it off to something totally different, it doesn't feel like I can handle just being with the irritation.

Nikki: I get what's happening, and thank you for sharing. I'm so sorry to hear that you've been so sick with COVID, Serena, and had to go to the hospital. I'm glad you're back at home and hopefully recovering.

Regarding your question about irritation, in the limited time left, a couple of things. One is, if the body is feeling ill or out of balance, if you're fighting a virus, then there's less room, really. It's like a tire where there's less air in the tire, so it's easier to get irritated. So, turn towards the irritation. Because when you're irritated, you are both hurting yourself and harming others. So bring compassion, especially when you're sick. Bring compassion, which is like a soothing salve, saying, "It's okay," as well as patience. Patience and compassion—those are the two antidotes for irritation.

Especially patience. It's not going to get any better or easier if you're irritated. It's a wisdom practice, bringing the patience in. So bring patience in, as well as compassion for yourself, who is really hurting right now with the irritation. Distraction is not a very good strategy. I mean, sometimes it can feel skillful, but overall it's better to actually work with it head-on with wisdom, bringing in a dose of patience and compassion for yourself who is suffering at that moment. So thank you for bringing that in, Serena. Thank you.

It is seven o'clock, and our time together has come to an end. Thank you all so much for your practice, for your cultivation of your heart for the sake of all beings. May all beings, including ourselves, be well. May all beings be free.