Metta Meditation Script—Loving-Kindness Meditation: Benefits, Practice, and Script

Loving kindness meditation is a popular self-care technique that can be used to boost well-being and reduce stress. You cannot pour from an empty cup and one way to help you fill that cup with love is through the help of a loving kindness meditation script. 

This article will take you to a run-through of what loving kindness meditation is, its benefits, practice tips, and a sample script—to guide your journey towards filling up that loving cup to the brim.

In This Article:

What is Loving-Kindness Meditation?
4 Major Qualities of True Love
Benefits of Loving Kindness Meditation
How to Practice LKM
Loving Kindness Meditation Script

What is Loving-Kindness Meditation?

Loving Kindness Meditation is also called “metta meditation”. Metta is a Pali term for loving-kindness, friendliness, benevolence, fellowship, amity, and concord. It is a form of giving selfless love towards self and others. It is the radiation of goodwill to all beings. According to Buddha, unless we treat ourselves with love and compassion, we cannot reflect the same on others’ and as with the loving-kindness meditation, it starts giving out loving-kindness to oneself first before giving it out to others.

4 Major Qualities of True Love

From a Buddhist perspective, four major qualities that consist love are friendliness (Metta), appreciation and joy (Mudita), compassion (Karuna), and equanimity (Upekkha).

• Metta or Maitri (Sanskrit)

It is the Sanskrit word for friend. It is said that friendship is the core of love for ourselves and others. It is in learning to befriend ourselves that we learn how to effectively befriend others. This goes the same about learning how to become at peace with ourselves so we could truly harmonize living with others. Believe me, you cannot truly know how to love others if you cannot love and accept yourself.

• Karuna, Compassion

Compassion is our yearning to act and help the suffering of others. The principle of ‘karuna’ is the sense of being able to relate to the suffering of others because we know what it’s like to be in their shoes. The empathy we have for them is lessons that we have learned when we started taking care of ourselves; it was then that we acquired the skill to help others do the same thing for themselves. As we recognize suffering as a universal condition we can learn to walk hand in hand with others.

3. Mudita, Sympathetic Joy

Understanding someone’s suffering means we also learn to share in someone’s joy or delight. Mudita is about appreciating the experience, (doesn’t matter what it is), and sharing it with others. Simply put is being with someone through their ups and downs.  This comes as a premise that you have been comfortable in your share of ‘good and bad’ that you can also stay with someone as they go through theirs.

4. Upeksha, Equanimity

Equanimity is the sense of calmness in the face of ambiguity. It is the concept of even-mindedness and letting go, meaning you love without possessiveness. One can love wholeheartedly if they also let themselves and others grow. Equanimity is respecting your freedom and the freedom of others. We liberate ourselves through a concept of acceptance and understanding that does not create restrictions, an open heart These four qualities are practiced in a loving-kindness meditation because this practice is about giving out encompassing love and goodwill to oneself and others (metta), a process of enjoying the experience and relating with the suffering and happiness of others (karuna and mudita) and it aims to give us a sense of freedom because it does not impose any expectation or binding (upeksha).

Benefits of Loving Kindness Meditation

In the meditation script later in this article, there would be mantras of kindness that will be repeated addressed to ourselves (“May you be well,” “May you be happy,” “May you be healthy,” etc.). These words harbor a profound sense of self-worth, appreciation, thankfulness, and reassurance to ourselves and others.

This positivity directed to ourselves and others  has a good effect on our mind and body, the following are just some of the proven benefits of loving-kindness meditation:

1. Increased self-appreciation

Frequent use of loving-kindness meditation script soothes the hardest critic within us and makes us more understanding and accepting (Frederickson, 2001). The more that we practice this kind of meditation, the less that we think of self-harming impulses (Fredrickson, Coffey, Finkel, Cohn, Pek, 2008) and self-criticizing activities. Our focus is now shifted on wishing goodwill to others.

2. Reduced pain symptoms

Researches on patients experiencing chronic pain (migraine and back) showed that the practice of the loving-kindness meditation for a mere 2-5 minutes helped ease signs of pain and aided them in the accomplishment of their daily chores by adding a sense of ease and relief (Tonelli et al., 2014; Carson et al., 2005).

3. More resilience

Trauma and flashback episodes of patients with long-term PTSD were reduced in a study on them that used self-love meditation. In a study by Kearney et. Al (2013) Control studies that used loving-kindness meditation scripts during their schedule were found to have easily resumed work than participants who received other types of guided meditation scripts.

4. Long-term welfare

In comparison to other meditation practices and self-help resources, loving-kindness was found to last its effect of positivity and self-motivation for up to 15 months after their intervention and increased their sense of affection empathy towards strangers and other social connections. According to Smith (2015), the basic positive emotions like empathy self-disclosure, and motivation are just some of the effects of loving kindness meditation— these emotions create a healthy mind, therefore rendering the effect of LKM as lasting.

5. Faster recovery

A study by Johnson et al., (2011) showed that the practice of LKM improved their sense of positivity and judgment of clinical populations (those with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia) and showed a significant decrease in their negative symptoms (hallucination and delusions).

How to Practice Loving Kindness Meditation

The next part of this article will outline a guided meditation script to help you to practice. But before we go over there here are quick tips to help in your meditation.

• Set a specific time to commit to meditation every day, consistency with the schedule is highly recommended.
• Always start with yourself. LKM uses mantras that you repeat for your wish of goodwill to yourself and others. As these praises and short phrases of blessings are repeated, try to notice the change that it does for you after each session.
• If it is your first time doing this set a timer for two minutes when you start, as you progress you can increase the time accordingly. This helps one’s worry about time ticking by and helps you focus. As you say the mantras to yourself, imagine yourself being encompassed by its meaning (imagine feeling safe when saying the words “May you be safe”; imagine feeling loved when saying “May you be loved”)
• Once you get used to accepting the loving-kindness you are giving to yourself, the next goal is to also direct the same wishes of benevolence to others.
• After meditation, recap the moments, feeling you’re your experience. A journal can be used to note and track how you felt each session (before and after). If, possible share to others the feeling of heightened awareness, its benefits that you have experienced to sustain interest and help you continue its practice in the long run.
• The foremost requirement of the loving-kindness practice is your comfort. There is a need to be comfortable with your physical body, your mental process, and the environment where you are going to meditate,  to fully immerse yourself in the experience. Some of these factors include:

1. The posture for meditation.
2. With the amount of light in the environment, it is preferable to be a moderately illuminated place 
3. It is ideal to have less noise for any meditation session.
4. Comfortable clothes – light and stretchy clothing provide comfort while sitting for long durations.
5. Avoid distractions – like TV, mobile phone, speakers, laptops, or other gadgets. Try to keep away from them during the meditation session.

Loving Kindness Meditation Script

This is a short script from positivepsychology.com:

1. Sit comfortably and take a few deep breaths to relax your body.
2. Tune in to the moment and begin with expressing gratitude to yourself for letting you commit to this beautiful loving-kindness practice today.
3. When you are ready, close your eyes and visualize yourself being loving and empathetic towards others. Notice how it makes you feel.
4. Next, thinking about yourself and everyone you know say – ‘May you have the strength to overcome all your struggles’, ‘May you always be honest and truthful’, ‘May you get all the happiness you deserve in life’, ‘May you always be surrounded with people who love you and care for you.’
5. At this point, do not try to discriminate who these good wishes are for. Allow the power of these positive contemplations to spread in your system and reflect in your persona.
6. Open your eyes after a few deep breaths, notice your feelings, and end the session by uttering ‘Namaste’ with joined hands.

Remember that we have to fill our cup first, it is only then that we could fill others. Wouldn’t it be nice to fill the cup of others instead of them filling ours. By practicing loving-kindness through guided meditation scripts—we might even have a chance of an overflow. Have you ever tried this Loving Kindness Meditation? I would love to hear below how it has helped you and if you have experienced an overflowing cup of love from it!