Great tip on metta practice from Ajahn Jayasaro, "be specific"

I heard this on an old recorded Dhamma talk of his, not a quote, just a very rough inaccurate paraphrase of the gist of what he said.

For someone who's a terrible person, doing terrible things, no normal person would have a genuine wish for them to unconditionally be happy.

But if you're skillful in "being specific" about how you do metta, with practice you can do metta where you genuinely wish for their happiness.

A couple of examples:

1. May that person stop doing terrible things so he can enjoy the peace of mind that comes from that and be happy as a result.

2. May that person realize what he's doing is terrible and harmful, and from that realization have wisdom arise and happiness with it that follows.

Comments

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