All You Need Is Love: LovingKindness Meditation

Sarah led us through a lovingkindness meditation class yesterday. Sarah pointed out that we often treat the ones we love with less thoughtfulness and courtesy than we do strangers in the street, so she took us through a process that began with loving ourselves unconditionally, expanding this love to someone we care for, to a stranger, to someone who has irritated us and, finally, sending our love out to a person who has harmed us, someone we dislike.

This is not easy practice.  We think of ourselves as "Me/I," as separate entities, when we are actually all of the same stuff.  That sense of separation makes us forget, makes us behave badly. Things fall apart.  It happens to everyone; how we handle the times when things are just not right is what leads us back to peace, contentment and love.  So, it pays to do a little work with lovingkindness, even when we get stuck and can't immediately find forgiveness and love in our hearts.

When everything around me comes crashing down, I turn to my wheel, or my spindle.  As I draft beautiful, simple fibres through my hands, I feel the flow of peaceful energy that comes as the fibres slip and slide, twisting into a single string that, with all its imperfections, is still beautiful.  I send my best thoughts and wishes through every bit of yarn I spin.  I feel the connection with all spinners who have gone before me and who share my passion now. 

Once I am able to find lovingkindness for other spinners and fibre workers, it is much easier for me to send that same emotion out to the world.  The hum and buzz of the wheel reminds me that we are all simply trying to find our voices, to connect with one another.

"I am here," we say, "I am someone worthy of love."  In sending our love out into the world, we are creating love for ourselves.

Namaste.