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Happy Hour: Metta through the Nourishment of Wholesome Intention

So for the theme for tonight, I'd like to do a guided exploration. First of all, as always, we start by settling in the breath, in the body. Stabilizing, calming, enjoying, taking delight and joy in sitting and breathing as an aspect of goodness. You know, one can think of metta^[1] as cultivating goodness.

Desire gets a bad rap in Buddhism, as if all desire is clinging and as if all desire is bad. There are many desires that are unwholesome and lead to clinging and suffering, but if you didn't have a wholesome desire, you wouldn't have made the attempt to show up in this moment, either on Zoom or on YouTube, to practice.

So there is a sense of wholesome desire leading you to take this action. There is a sense of wholesome desire for you wanting to practice. There's a wholesome desire for you in the morning getting out of bed, taking care of yourself, taking care of this body that is yours, taking care of others in your life, contributing in whatever ways you can. There is a goodness, there is a beauty, there's a grace. And this aspect of wishing, wanting this wholesome desire—it's not in the way of clinging and grasping, but the aspiration, the uplift that is present in the wholesomeness of intention. There's a goodness in that, in cultivating that and recognizing that.

If you can, if you resonate with what I'm talking about, if you recognize in yourself the sense of wholesome desire for having shown up in various ways, give me a thumbs up or maybe nod your head so I know you're following. Yes, you recognize, yes. So not all desire is bad. That's something I want to explore in today's guided meditation.

Guided Meditation

So without further ado, I'd like to invite you to get into your meditation posture. Finding how you can comfortably sit. Ah, and letting yourself land. Letting your body land in this room.

Settling. Settling first and foremost the sensations of the body, with each breath helping you land. With each out-breath, letting go of more holding, tightness, dropping in the inside. As if the center of your gravity is being lowered, lowered from your head, to your chest, your heart center.

Then after a pause, lower it again. Hold the out-breath, lower it into your abdomen. Mmmm. To your sit bones, your legs, into your feet. Hmm.

See if you need to do this in your own time a couple more times. With the out-breath settling, bringing down the center of gravity from your thinking head down: chest, abdomen, sit bones, legs, and feet. Ah, landing, really landing more deeply. Your sit bones into your feet, your hands. Letting the breath breathe you in the lower parts of your body, grounding you.

And as thoughts arise—memories, plans—with the out-breath, inviting them to flow down. Flow down, become tethered, grounded. The same way that you lowered the center of gravity of your awareness, inviting thoughts to flow down to be grounded with the breath and body.

Spending a few minutes here just being breathed. Enjoying being embodied, grounded, and being breathed. Letting your heart, your body, your mind enjoy the deliciousness of just sitting and being breathed this moment. Nothing to do, nowhere to go. Just this moment, the delight of taking refuge^[2] in the bare simplicity, now, this moment's awareness.

And knowing that simply by the act of sitting here and practicing, not judging your practice, without attachment to outcome—even if the mind is wandering, not a problem. Tuning into the goodness. The fact that you are making an attempt. You're showing up in this moment in this way as best as you're able to, without judging. You set aside the time to tune in. Tune in to yourself as best as you're able to. In this cultivation practice that we're all doing together, tune into the goodness that's generated simply from this wholesome desire.

A sense of goodness. Let yourself be held by recognizing this goodness. It's an offering—this intention, this attempt, this act, regardless of how "successful" is your offering. Your offering from your heart to yourself, to the life force, and to others. So letting your heart relish the goodness, your own goodness in this moment. Very simple. Doesn't have to be huge, but big. Just the goodness generated right here, right now. Your offering. Humble offering. Beautiful, graceful. Let yourself breathe, and your heart center be held by this goodness. It is goodness. It is of the same cloth of all the goodness in the world, this goodness in your heart. Let yourself feel held in it, wrapped in it.

From the sense of goodness, letting your heart open up to a sense of safety. May I feel safe. May I feel safe, held by the cloth of this goodness generated by my wholesome intention, desire. Maybe you imagine this place, this cloth of goodness, soft, safe, holding you, offering you its goodness. Keep breathing.

And I invite you to connect with a sense of happiness, well-being in the mind, joy. The second metta phrase born out of this goodness. Goodness gives rise to happiness and joy in your heart; it can't be otherwise. They are linked. Born out of your wholesome intention, desire, action, the goodness generated holds you. There is a spring of happiness and joy from the goodness, intertwined with the goodness. What is good is gladness in itself. There can be an allowing of feeling the gladness in your heart, letting it in. May I feel gladness. May I feel joy in my heart.

Feeling connected to the goodness. The goodness of meditating together in different time zones, different states, countries, homes. Some gladness arising from this goodness. Joy of interconnection. Being part of something bigger than yourself.

Now connecting with the third metta phrase. A wish for physical well-being, connected to the goodness in your heart center. A sense of vitality, a sense of energizing aliveness, allowing you to move through your body. Nourishing from the goodness in your heart, from your wholesome intention, desire, action. Hmm. Letting yourself breathe. Breathe in, breathe out vitality throughout your limbs. May I feel healthy and strong.

Now I like to invite you to connect with the fourth and last metta phrase. Wish for well-being. For ease, for peace. Again, connecting this time with the goodness generated from your wholesome action, wholesome desire in this moment of showing up, aligning your actions with your intentions. Feeling the goodness generated in ways you can't quite fathom or understand. Allowing it to be unfathomable, multi-dimensional, this goodness, the seed that is planted. Allowing your heart, your mind to connect with the peace, with the ease, with the calm, the expansiveness of this goodness permeating through your heart, through your body, and beyond.

Connecting with a felt sense of the goodness. This cultivation practice of goodwill, friendliness, metta, starting for ourselves. This being that is us, you are entrusted to take care of. Cultivating friendliness, connecting goodwill, warm care, goodness for this being first. And when your cup is full, it overflows naturally without any neediness from others, to others. So filling your heart, connecting with the goodness, your own goodness.

Now I invite you to allow this goodness—arisen from your wholesome desire, intention for showing up and practicing without attachment to outcome—to let it shine out. Let it flow from your heart, your heart center. Letting the goodness shine with wishes of well-being, wishes of safety, happiness, health, and ease. Beaming, beaming this goodness. This offering. Your life as an offering. Your wholesome intentions, your wholesome desires as an offering. It's the way you live your life. This precious, fleeting, short, very brief life. Shining this goodness as an offering to all beings. Wishing goodness. Wishing to be of benefit in whatever way is unique to you. Your own unique expression of goodness and wholesomeness.

Expressed perhaps as friendliness, as metta, as goodwill, non-harming. A wish for non-harming anyone you come in contact with, including yourself. Not harming yourself, not harming others. Not harming 360 degrees, including yourself. Staying connected with the breath in your heart center.

And I'd like to invite you, you can either stay with beaming metta and goodwill, or if you wish, I have an invitation to explore your wholesome intention and wholesome desire some more. As you sit and you're being breathed in your heart center, this being that is you, and this birth, in this shape, in this form. Dropping the question into your heart, into your body. Not into your head, into your heart. As if you're dropping a pebble into a body of water, dropping the question into your heart:

What do you truly want? How do you want to show up in your life? This precious, fleeting life. What gift do you have to offer to goodness itself, to the beyond, to the world, to others, to yourself?

Just drop the questions. Don't try to answer them. Maybe an answer comes up, maybe not. Live and love the questions themselves. Maybe no answer comes up and that's fine. Just live and love the questions themselves. Sit with the question, allowing the question to fill you, fill your whole body, resonate throughout your whole body. Starting with your heart, throughout your body, resonating energetically.

How do you want to show up? What is your gift of goodness to yourself, to others, to the world, to the beyond? What is your wholesome desire rooted in goodness, ethics, and values?

And for the last moments of this practice period, holding yourself in kindness. Appreciating yourself, your own inner beauty and goodness for having shown up, for having practiced in community without attachment to outcome. No judging, no need, no need. Practice of cultivation of metta. Whatever arose, holding it with kindness, with a smile. Appreciation of your own inner goodness for having been here in this moment.

Community Reflections

Thank you all, welcome back. I'd like to invite you to perhaps share what's arising for you in this moment. Either type it in chat, you can unmute yourself if you wish, and I'll share what comes up for me in this moment.

I'll start. I think a sense of calmness. The questions that I was offering at the end are resonating for me. I'm living them, and it's nice to let them sit without demanding an answer, but a sense of living and loving the questions themselves. So please, what's arising for you in this moment if you'd like to share and bring it into the community?

"Wholesome desire to know," Victor offers. Thank you, Victor. Now offers, "Practicing for practice and not for an outcome." Lovely. Olivia offers, "Deep gratitude for the Triple Gem^[3]." Lovely, beautiful, thank you. Mmm, Susan offers, "Living into the answers." Lovely, yeah. Lisa offers, "Self-compassion, healing." Beautiful, thank you. Austin offers, "Calm, more clarity, a little sadness." Yes, all welcome. Laura offers on YouTube, "Thank you, I needed that." You're welcome, Laura, glad you could join. Lovely. Ah, yeah, a little sadness, all welcome. No part left out. Laura also offers, "Being with the calm breath." Yeah, lovely. Yas now offers, "Exhausted." Yes, that too. Being in touch with the exhaustion of the day. Yeah.

All welcome. No part left out. Holding all with care, appreciating the goodness of having shown up however you showed up. With exhaustion, sadness, self-compassion, healing, gratitude, questions, desire to know.

Paul offers, "Been remembering my mom today as she would have been 81 today, and continuing into this practice." Ah, thank you, Paul, for bringing her into this space. Yeah, sweet.

Breakout Rooms and Living the Questions

So at this time, I'd like to invite us into practicing with each other in community. Appreciating our own goodness and appreciating each other's goodness and the sense of questions, this curiosity. Living with your own questions, and as you hold each other, holding each other with a tender curiosity. See how the interaction changes if you bring a sense of tender curiosity as the other person shares for a couple of minutes each.

The prompt is: How are you? How was this practice? And there's no right or wrong. You fell asleep? No problem. It's just about how we show up and noticing, really noticing an interaction, how this appreciating goodness, inner and outer, and the gentle curiosity shows up. So I will create the breakout rooms now, and if you decide tonight is not the right time for you to engage, that's perfectly fine too, understandable. But I do hope that you stay and participate because it can be quite beautiful.

(While rooms are opening) I wanted to first share in chat, I've just typed a quote from Rilke^[4] I wanted to share with you:

"Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer."

Post-Breakout Reflections

So I would love to hear some reflections. How was your practice together? How were both parts of your practice? Please feel free to unmute yourself.

Richard: I just want to say thank you Nikki. Thank you to all that are still here for your practice.

Nikki: Thank you Richard, thank you for showing up and practicing.

Participant: I want to say thank you for providing a safe place for sharing.

Nikki: Thank you for calling that out. That's a gift that we all give to each other. It's the goodness that I was talking about and trying to evoke in the meditation. This goodness is what we offer ourselves and we offer each other in this showing up. And it's beautiful, isn't it? Didn't you feel the goodness in the rooms? Yeah, we take it for granted and yet it's there. It's so beautiful. What else?

Olivia: Just love seeing everyone's smile. It amplifies whatever joy I'm already feeling, it just gets so much bigger.

Nikki: Well said. Nice smile. As I look at your beautiful smile Olivia, you're beaming. It's lovely. Other reflections? Please feel free to unmute yourself, especially if you haven't spoken before.

Austin: I remember I did the mindfulness of death retreat along with you maybe two or three years ago. I remember going into it wanting to come out with my priorities in life more clear-eyed, like what I really want. And I remember you did a meditation towards the very end of that where it was like you're on your deathbed and asked, what do you really need to finish up right now? The whole retreat was kind of just everything kept changing, there were chapters of it, but towards the end especially, it was really like, I really just need to let go of everything. When you asked the question at the end of the meditation like, 'What do you really want?' some things were coming up, and then I kind of resorted back to that same feeling of, I really just need to let go. Yeah, and I just get really frustrated with things in my life, and it was good to remember that.

Nikki: Thank you. Thank you Austin, thank you so much for bringing that in. The practice of mindfulness of death (maraṇasati)^[5], it's so clarifying as to what is really important, what do you really want. And there were definitely echoes of that in the practice tonight also as I was inviting you to realize this is a short-lived, precious life. I appreciate hearing how bringing that reflection up for you is so clarifying. It's a valuable reflection. It's a profound reflection no matter how old one is. So thank you for bringing that into the space. Beautiful.

Well, that's a profound note to end on. Really appreciate all of you showing up tonight. Oh, and now offers, "Finding nourishment by enjoying getting lost in the woods." That's sweet.

So yeah, I want to thank all of you wherever you're showing up from, whether it's morning in Singapore for now, or late at night for Barbara in Florida on the East Coast of the United States, or early evening-ish for many of us, or whether you're in Canada showing up like Kim. All of you are welcome. It just makes me so happy to see you all. Thank you all for showing up and practicing both for yourself and for everyone else.

May all beings be safe, may all beings be happy, may all beings be free, including us.

Thank you. May you live and love the questions themselves. Take care, bye.