Check out this ancient meditation and bask in effects. The words came from my Buddhist meditation teacher, Ji Hyang Padua of Wellesley College, who learned it from her teachers.  In less than ten minutes, it heals your heart and soothes your mind.  Rick Hanson, Ph.D., the neuropsychologist who wrote Buddha’s Brain, sites brain scan research showing the beneficial health effects of meditation, especially a loving kindness mindfulness meditation like this one. If you decide to try the audio tape, I’d love to hear how it made you feel. Or just try saying the following words slowly to yourself, pausing between lines to fill yourself with the intention.  Enjoy!

• May I be held in loving kindness.
• May I be filled with loving kindness.
• May I accept myself exactly as I am.
• May I feel the joy and wonder of being alive.
• May I feel deep and natural peace.
• May my heart and mind awaken.
• May I be free!

After that, say it again, this time thinking of someone you love:

• May they be held in loving kindness.
• May they be filled with loving kindness
• May they accept themselves exactly as they are.
• May they feel the joy and wonder of being alive.
• May they feel deep and natural peace.
• My their hearts and minds awaken.
• May they be free.

Finally, say it again, this time applying it to everyone you know, your friends and relatives, colleages, everyone in our country and in all the countries, all the creatures on the earth, birds in the sky and fish in the sea:

• May they be held in loving kindness.
• May they be filled with loving kindness
• May they accept themselves exactly as they are.
• May they feel the joy and wonder of being alive.
• May they feel deep and natural peace.
• My their hearts and minds awaken.
• May they be free.