Loving Kindness Meditation

Advanced

Skill Level:

The practice of locating and sensing love and kindness in your body, and then sending warm intentions both inward and outward by repeating the following phrases in your heart: May I be safe, protected, and free from both inner and outer harm. May I be happy and contented. May I be healthy and whole
to whatever degree possible. May I experience ease and well-being.

This technique is part of the Expanding phase of SERA, in which the OD practitioner must help participants shift their consciousness into a non-conceptual domain. With expanding the goal is to open conscious awareness further and deeper into a non-conceptual, sensate, and intuitive quality of awareness. In this way, the practitioner helps the client establish a more spacious orientation of awareness, in which sensing is amplified and thoughts are recognized like objects with various levels emotional intensity and attachment rather than truths.

As you think of unique ways to apply this technique to a new OD solution, remember that the aim of the Expanding phase is to stretch consciousness further into non-conceptual, sensate, and meta-egoic forms of awareness.

Hutcherson, C. A., Seppala, E. M., & Gross, J. J. (2008). Loving-kindness meditation increases social connectedness. Emotion, 8(5), 720.
Zeng, X., Chiu, C. P., Wang, R., Oei, T. P., & Leung, F. Y. (2015). The effect of loving-kindness meditation on positive emotions: a meta-analytic review. Frontiers in psychology, 6, 1693.