Maitri Bhavana Practice

A Beautiful Practice to Share With Others

 

 

May I be Happy

May I be Healthy

May I be Safe

May I be at Ease

 



Maitri bhavana needs to be cultivated regularly in meditation and then practiced in daily living. Sit down with deep relaxation. Focus on breathing with your whole body. Concentrate on the heart center and cultivate maitri feeling for yourself, a friend, a neutral person, a difficult person, and to all sentient beings. Send thought-vibrations of love, appreciation, forgiveness, apology and good wishes through imagination or creative visualization.

It is easier to develop maître bhavana for self, friends or a neutral person. However, the real challenge lies in developing this for an enemy, with whom we are in conflict. We need to probe and ponder over their good qualities and analyze why they do what they do. We should be ready to ask for an apology, if it is called for, or forgive. After Angulimal, a highway robber and dacoit, became Buddhist under the influence of the Buddha, villagers pelted stones at him and his whole body was bleeding; yet his heart was full of repentance, forgiveness, and love.”  https://unquote.wordpress.com/category/within-and-without/page/6/