Welcome to this Meditation on Love with Peter Radcliffe.
Before we can start this meditation on love we must consider two things.
The first is the definition of love because it seems that every person has a different idea of what love is.
So for the purposes of this meditation the definition of love will be simply to want other beings to be happy.
Now if that's the definition love is not necessarily constrained to just our family or people that are close to us but we should be able to love everyone in the same way and wish that everyone were to be happy.
The second thing we should consider is that of equanimity and that is that every being on earth deserves the possibility to be happy and in everyone's heart we are all equal in that we want to avoid suffering and try to gain happiness.
So if we consider that equality between all beings even animals and that we all deserve happiness and that love is simply wanting that for other people we can begin this meditation.
So first of all come mindfully into the here and now and begin by creating a visualization of yourself sitting on an infinite plane with all the people in the world sitting around you.
Imagine your mother on your left and your father on your right and even if they've passed away just imagine them sitting there in full health and all your friends and family around you.
Now we are also going to visualize those people that we have difficulty with and to visualize those sitting in front of you everyone facing the same direction facing forward but consider all those people you have difficulty with at work,
The politicians that we love to hate,
Famous people,
People that just you know but all of those people that we have had arguments with or disagreements with put those in front of you and then around those people and the people that we are close to us imagine all other beings people that you are only slightly familiar with right through to complete strangers and all beings on the earth.
You can even imagine that all animals are sitting beyond all the people that every sentient being is sitting with us all in the same direction on this infinite plane and our job will be to share our love with all beings but first we must connect with that love to try to imagine a time when you really felt loved and you loved a person back.
Now it might be a spouse or your mother and father or it might be a special grandma or a special auntie maybe imagine a time when you are baking cookies together or doing some activity where you felt especially loved and try to connect in with that time.
Remember back and see the things you saw,
Hear the things you heard and the words that were spoken and feel those feelings of love bubbling up inside you.
It is that warm luminous energy that we are going to send to others but it is said that before you can love others you must first love yourself.
So go ahead and wish yourself every happiness that you could possibly have.
Notice if this is easy to do,
If you find it difficult to truly love yourself and wish yourself all the happiness in the world you might consider this as something you should work on but for now go ahead and spread that warm luminous energy throughout your body wishing yourself every happiness and when you feel that love towards yourself go and imagine that warm energy shining out from your heart in like rays of sunshine touching the loved ones around you,
Your mother and father and other family members and notice when your love touches them their hearts glow and in turn send the light back to you.
Feel that warmth surrounding you,
Moving through you and growing in you so that that love continues to grow.
And now we come to the more difficult part of the meditation.
I'd like you to focus your attention on those people in front of you for if love were universal we need to not just constrain it to a few people but to involve all people.
Are you able to find love in your heart for even those people you have difficulty with?
Wish them to be free of any anger,
Confusion,
Hatred,
Self-centeredness or problems in their own life that are making them suffer.
Pour that light of your love inside and heal them of their own pain.
Perhaps as a result of this love you can see that they then extend their love out to others including you.
Try to visualize yourself dissolving any pain around disagreements of the past and feel that love towards those people that you find difficult,
Your enemies and such.
And once you've touched those that are close to you and those that are difficult extend that love out to even strangers,
All beings around the world.
The lonely,
The sick,
The hungry,
The confused,
The oppressed,
The frightened,
The cold,
Those in pain and suffering in any way.
As well as those that aren't suffering make your love unbiased and send it to all people wishing them to be free from any suffering that they have and to be as happy as it is possible to be.
And again notice that like a chain reaction as you touch them with your love,
They in turn begin to glow and send their love out to others.
And again notice that as you touch them with your love,
They in turn feel love spreading out from them and touch others with their light including yourself.
So that eventually there is a web of love and that all beings in the world just wish for the happiness of each other.
You can conclude that you definitely have the potential to love everybody,
To generate a strong wish to work on your own anger or impatience so that you may generate this equanimitous and unbiased love for all beings alike.
Continue meditating in this way for as long as possible.
