--- ai_generation_date: '2026-06-30' ai_model: gemini-3-pro-preview audiodharma: talks: - date: '2021-05-03' mp3_url: https://audiodharma.us-east-1.linodeobjects.com/talks/13428/20210503-Nikki_Mirghafori-IMC-happy_hour_generously_sprinkling_goodwill_practice.mp3 speakers: - speaker_name: Nikki Mirghafori speaker_url: https://www.audiodharma.org/speakers/229 talk_start_time_seconds: 0 title: 'Happy Hour: Generously Sprinkling Goodwill Practice' url: https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/13428 video_unavailable: false location_city: Redwood City, CA video_unavailable: false youtube: id: jHR0k8e3bss imprecise_upload_date: '2022-05-04' title: 'Happy Hour: Generously Sprinkling Goodwill' upload_date: null uploader_str: Insight Meditation Center uploader_url: https://www.youtube.com/@InsightMeditationCenter youtube_url: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHR0k8e3bss --- # Happy Hour: Generously Sprinkling Goodwill Practice - [Nikki Mirghafori](https://www.audiodharma.org/speakers/229) *This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video above. It likely contains inaccuracies, especially with speaker attribution if there are multiple speakers.* ## [Happy Hour: Generously Sprinkling Goodwill Practice](https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/13428) Hello and a warm welcome wherever you are in the world, and however the weather is externally and internally. I am happy to be practicing together; it warms my heart. For the practice today, the theme I wanted to invite us to explore is practicing *metta*[^1], cultivating goodwill and generosity of heart. This gift of the heart—*metta*, kindness, goodwill, whatever we call it, a rose by any name is just as fragrant and sweet—when we cultivate this sense of friendliness for others, it is actually a gift to ourselves. It really makes us happy, it makes us calm, and there is a sense of peace, ease, and beauty that our heart revels in. I especially want to invite this practice if the internal weather at times is gray, or say you're lying in bed and having a hard time falling asleep. There are so many different forms of this practice, but the way I'd like to invite us to explore it today is just offering. It is offering gifts of generosity, gifts of *metta*, gifts of kindness. Imagine as if you discovered you're Santa Claus, and you have this bag of gifts. It's goodness, and it's a never-ending bag of goodness, blessings, and kindness that you didn't even know you had. The more you give it, the more it gets filled up. It's not like, "Oh, if I give away this goodness, these blessings, these wishes for other people's well-being, there won't be enough for me." It's like, "Oh no, there will be more! I can just go and bless people with these gifts of kindness." So that's one image we can work with. Another image is you can imagine you're a fairy going around, and you are blessing people with these wishes of goodness. There's different imagery that we're going to invite today as skillful means. See what works for you. The purpose here is to cultivate our hearts in generosity of goodwill for others, and what we will discover is that we are the ones who feel safe, happy, healthy, and at ease. We have a sense of goodness, a sense of brightness. I'll share with you that some nights ago I was having trouble falling asleep, and this is the practice I did. I was just sharing goodness, sharing *metta* for others in my imagination: people I knew, imaginary beings all over the world, people near and far, my challenging categories, people I care about. Just gifts of goodness. Soon enough, there was a sense of gladness, bliss, and happiness in my heart. That night, I actually had very happy dreams. The sense of gladness and abundance of the heart just continued in the dream space. I invite you to explore this not just here as we will explore it together, but maybe tonight when you're about to fall asleep and lying in bed. Practice it and see what happens. One last thing to say to set the stage before we start is that we do all this practice, as always, without attachment to outcome. Yes, we know that the world is uncertain, there is impermanence. As we wish well for others, it's not with a sense of clinging to outcome. We don't say, "We want you to be happy now, why aren't you happy yet?" It's more a sense of cultivating our own heart without attachment to outcome. It's a cultivation of generosity in the way we show up in the world. When we actually interact with others, we realize, "Wow, there's a lot of kindness, there's a lot of generosity, there's a lot of goodwill." It's like athletes who imagine doing a stroke or a particular game. There is research suggesting that when we do these imaginary practices in our minds, those physical muscles actually get stronger, as if we had exercised. It is the same way with these muscles of the heart: these practices of kindness, generosity, goodwill, and gladness that we share, we just become more glad. You probably know this by now already, having practiced with Happy Hour for a while. Let's get started without further ado. ## Guided Meditation I'd like to invite you to land in your body. To arrive. Letting go. Letting go of all the words. Letting go of whatever has come before. Just a moment of quiet, silent refuge in this body with this breath. Settling, receiving one breath at a time. Letting go, letting go, letting go. Letting go of tightness, tension. The legs letting their weight drop into the earth, into the cushion. Letting go. The weight, the sit bones, your abdomen dropping, dropping into the chair, into the cushion, from the inside. Dropping the weight. Your whole trunk, the chest, arms, the hands offering their weight to the earth. Neck and shoulders, the head. This whole body, this whole body offering its weight to the earth. Earth sitting on earth. Letting each breath be received in the abdomen. Softening, relaxing, letting go more deeply with each out-breath. Spend a few minutes just settling, taking refuge in this moment. If thoughts arise, letting them go for now. Not now, not now. So much more nourishing to be with the breath and the body in this moment than lost in thought. Now I'd like to invite you to bring to mind someone about whom your care, your goodwill flows with ease. It can be a child, or a pet, a friend, a benefactor. Someone you easily wish well. You would like them to be happy, healthy. You have natural goodwill for them. It doesn't have to be big or overpowering. You just like this person. Maybe when you think of them, you feel safe, comfortable. Now imagine, like Santa Claus, you have a bag that's filled with goodness. Bright goodness, blessings. Imagine you reach into the bag and you shower this person with goodness. And the more you do this, the more you share, the more goodness becomes available in your bag. The more you spread it, the more there is to spread. The more you give, the more there is to give. Now, if you wish, imagining other people whom you know and you have an easy relationship with. Spreading and blessing them with the contents of this bag. Spreading goodness, spreading well-being. Giving it away for free, generously, noticing the more there is. Magically, you didn't realize you had so much goodwill to give away, but here it is. It's kind of fun to be spreading so much gold dust, happiness dust, goodness dust. Imagining just for the purpose of this practice, again without attachment to outcome, that as you spread this happiness dust, it touches people and brings them well-being. Sharing, spreading well-being. And yes, of course, you can throw some on yourself. Spread it into the air and let it drop on you, and wow, nice. Being showered with goodness dust, like gold dust. Spreading more. Imagining your neighbors, people you don't know, each and every one of them. Children. Blessing them with this goodness, this blessing, this *metta* dust. *Metta* sprinkles. May you be safe. May you be happy. May you be healthy. May you have ease. Sharing this *metta* dust, blessing people who are different from you. Different gender identity, different race, age, ability, size. Be creative. And know the more you give, the more you spread, the more there is in the bag and the more there is in your heart. The more gets automatically spread upon yourself. The hand that spreads this *metta* dust has a lot of *metta* dust on it. In your own time, using your imagination and skillful means, spreading this *metta* dust to whatever beings you wish. Human beings, people you know, you care about, people with whom you have some entanglement if that comes easily. Yourself now and then. People in other continents, countries. Animals. All beings. Have fun with spreading *metta*. And if it works, you can also say the phrases while you spread the *metta*: May you be safe. May there be safety for you. May there be happiness, joy for you. May there be health, strength for your body. May there be ease for you. May your life flow with ease. Sprinkling all over the earth. Have fun, make it joyous. And spread on yourself now and then. There's plenty to go around. You can sprinkle *metta* over all categories if you wish. Sprinkling *metta* over all creatures who fly. Even more specifically, sprinkling *metta* over all the bees that pollinate. Over all ducks. Let yourself have fun. As we approach the last couple minutes of this practice period, sprinkling, spreading *metta* sprinkles from this ever-growing bag for all those who are practicing together with us. In the Zoom room, on YouTube, and AudioDharma, all fellow practitioners in this moment, future, and the past. Sharing wishes of well-being, goodness. Giving it away freely. Letting ourselves, letting our own heart be sprinkled, quenched by the generosity of the *metta* wishes of well-being. Feeling gladness and well-being in having spread, having cultivated friendliness, goodwill, *metta*. If there are any judgments coming up—"Oh, this wasn't good enough, the mind was distracted, sleepy, anxious," whatever—it's okay. Reach into the bag and spread some goodwill over the judgments, some friendliness. May all beings, all beings everywhere, be well and be free. ## Reflections and Q&A Thank you so much, everyone. Thank you for your practice. Spreading *metta*, spreading goodwill, and realizing the more we spread it, the more there is for us. I'd love to hear your reflections. What did you discover? What happened? What worked? What was challenging? I'd love to hear your insights. **Bill:** I was thinking about what you said about doing *metta* at bedtime, and I've tried that before. For me, it's not sleep-inducing; it tends to be more emotional. I don't think I'm clinging—at least I don't think I am—but that's what I'm sharing. **Nikki Mirghafori:** Interesting, Bill. Actually, in the eleven benefits of *metta* in the suttas[^2], one of the benefits is that you sleep happily and have happy dreams. So these two items are actually part of the *metta* benefits. It would be interesting to bring some more curiosity to your practice to see why there is clinging. Is there attachment to outcome? Because if you're saying, "Well, I don't think there is," maybe that's a pointer. Maybe that's what's agitating the mind, really wanting, instead of just really giving it away. When you just give goodness away, you feel lighter, relaxed, and the heart falls asleep with happiness and gladness. Please bring some curiosity to what's causing that contraction, because it's not exactly supposed to be that way. Jerry says in the chat, "Very lifting and allowed me to calm and focus *metta* towards others. Lovely, thank you." Mark on YouTube says, "That was so much fun, so worthwhile. Thank you and good night." I'm glad it was fun, Mark; I had fun too. Armando, please. **Armando:** I have a question. When there are hindrances[^3] present—it could be restlessness or worry—do you think it's a good idea to first take care of the hindrances and then do *metta*, or maybe *metta* can be a way of helping with the hindrances? Sometimes if the hindrances are strong, it may be difficult to do *metta*. **Nikki Mirghafori:** That's a great question. You can experiment with either and both depending on a given situation. If the hindrance is so strong that *metta* is feeling really challenging, then turn attention to the hindrance, either with wisdom practice or by entirely turning towards it with *metta*. If it's not very strong, then you can continue the practice and just let the hindrance be there without having to push it away. Let it feel supported. So it's a decision tree. The first decision is: is it a really strong or weak hindrance? If it's weak, you can continue the *metta* and not try to push it away, but let it be included. "Yeah, I know you're here, restlessness. It's okay sweetie, we're just gonna do this and you can come along." Now, if it's really strong, you turn towards it with wisdom practices, or you turn towards it wholly with *metta*. One thing I would warn against is trying to get rid of the hindrance *with* *metta*. That can become conflictual. If you're doing *metta* in order to get rid of it, it's not really *metta*. Give it space with a sense of, "Okay, restlessness, worry, okay. Let your hindrance feel safe." If you're holding a child that's crabby and crying, you don't try to say, "Shut up, be quiet, I'm trying to do *metta*!" It's like, "Oh sweetie, okay, what's going on? It's alright, it's okay." You turn towards it with *metta*. **Ben:** I was listening to a dharma talk the other day on generosity as a transformational tool for the attitude we bring to the world. Specifically, that it's a great remedy to the feeling that there's not enough for me, and that attitude can often be accompanied by an unhelpful degree of sense of self. That makes a lot of sense to me. This teacher was saying that this implies the instruction: if you feel like there's not enough for you, give. If that's doable, that sounds great. But for me personally, that's exactly when I don't feel like I can make that first reach into my pocket to give, so I strap myself up. **Nikki Mirghafori:** I hear where you're going. I think what I want to connect with is that in the practice we did tonight, this imagination of a never-ending bag means you don't have to imagine a situation where there's a scarcity mindset. This is actually what can cultivate and train your mind that there is plenty of goodness to go around. My invitation would be to use this practice as a stepping stone, because there's no way you can imagine that you've given goodness away and there isn't anything left. Does that make sense, Ben? **Ben:** It makes sense in concept, but I think to really get the energetic feeling that the stuff in the bag is a resource, I would still sort of have a problem with it. **Nikki Mirghafori:** I think you're thinking too hard! Do this practice as invited, just imagining that the more you give, the more there is, because that is the case with generosity, kindness, and goodwill. Start it here. If you try to stop yourself before you actually go there, you're shooting yourself in the foot. In the imagination space, there's nothing that can stop you. I'm saying this from experience having tried it. At this point, this is all I have to offer, which is to hang in there with it. *(The group transitions to small breakout rooms and then returns)* **Nikki Mirghafori:** Welcome back. The rooms are closed and we have just about a minute for one final reflection or comment. How was it to do this practice of generosity in community, Terrance? **Terrance:** I found it extremely supportive. The little group interaction I had was delightful and helpful in many ways. But we didn't go with your bag of goodness thing! We were joined together and pooh-poohing your bag idea! [Laughter] **Nikki Mirghafori:** All good! So what worked for you? What was important for you? **Terrance:** I just had a kind of natural flowing of generosity toward myself. I've been taking medications lately for pain, and part of me typically in the past would have said, "No, this is not good, you don't want to take very much of that." But I'm doing what the doctor said. I'm taking a full load, and it's okay, I'm being generous with myself. **Nikki Mirghafori:** Nice! Whatever brings up a sense of generosity, Terrance, yay! I celebrate that with you with *mudita*[^4]. Fantastic. It doesn't have to be a bag. It could just be whatever brings up a sense of generosity flowing, whatever imagery, whatever skillful means. For many people, it could just be a beaming of generosity, a sense of light. Whatever made it work for you—yay, fantastic for you and others. Thank you all for your practice, for doing this work not just for yourself, but for all beings everywhere. May all beings be happy. May all beings be free. Thank you. --- [^1]: **Metta:** A Pali word commonly translated as "loving-kindness," "goodwill," or "friendliness." It is an active wish for the well-being, safety, and happiness of oneself and others. [^2]: **Suttas:** The discourses or teachings of the Buddha as preserved in the Pali Canon. The text outlining the eleven benefits of *metta* is the *Mettanisamsa Sutta*. [^3]: **Hindrances:** In Buddhist teaching, the Five Hindrances are mental states that impede practice and cloud the mind: sensory desire, ill will, sloth and torpor, restlessness and worry, and doubt. [^4]: **Mudita:** A Pali word translated as "sympathetic joy" or "appreciative joy." It is the joy felt in the good fortune, success, and well-being of others.