July 31, 2026

Begin The Circle With Yourself

May I be free from danger. May I have mental happiness. May I have physical happiness. May I have ease of well-being.

Sharon Salzberg co-founded the Insight Meditation Society in the 1970s and later wrote Lovingkindness to bring the ancient practice of metta bhavana to Western readers overwhelmed by self-criticism and isolation. These four phrases are the traditional formula she teaches for opening a lovingkindness practice, and she insists they begin with oneself, not with someone easier to love. The wording itself is simple: wishing safety, mental ease, physical ease, and well-being, repeated slowly until the words start to feel true. In the Buddhist understanding, compassion is not sentimentality but a trainable capacity of the heart, cultivated first toward the self because an unloved self has little real kindness left to give others. The tradition holds that the circle of care must include the one holding it before it can honestly widen to include everyone else.

A principle of Eastern Wisdom: Compassion and Lovingkindness →