Fifteen minutes, six segments. The four phrases stay identical throughout — only who you send them to changes. Don't be tempted to vary the wording.
Settling, and the phrases
2 min 30[read the four phrases slowly the first time — the listener is learning them and will repeat them twenty more times]
This is loving-kindness — metta. Sit however you're comfortable. You can close your eyes or lower them.
The practice is simple to describe and not always easy to do. There are four phrases, and we send them to five different people in turn. The phrases never change. [pause for 10 seconds]
The phrases are these. May you be safe. May you be well. May you be at ease. May you live with kindness. [pause for 15 seconds]
One thing worth knowing before we start: you may feel nothing much, and you may hit something uncomfortable. Both are ordinary. You're not trying to manufacture a feeling — you're just saying the words and seeing what they meet.
Yourself
3 min[the hardest one for most people — say it without pressure, and mean the escape hatch at the end]
We start with you. Bring yourself to mind — not an idea of yourself, just the person sitting here, breathing, at the end of whatever kind of day it's been. [pause for 20 seconds]
And say to yourself, silently: May I be safe. [pause 10 seconds after each phrase throughout]
May I be well. May I be at ease. May I live with kindness. [long pause — 45 seconds; let them go round again on their own]
If offering this to yourself feels awkward, or false, you're in good company — it's the part people find hardest. If it won't come, picture yourself as a child and say it to them instead. [pause for 30 seconds]
Someone easy to love
2 min 30[the warmest segment — let that show, it's the reservoir the later ones draw on]
Now bring to mind someone you love easily. A friend, a family member, a child, an animal. Somebody your feelings toward are uncomplicated. See them where you usually see them. [pause for 20 seconds]
May you be safe. May you be well. May you be at ease. May you live with kindness. [long pause — 45 seconds]
Notice what that felt like in the body. Somewhere in the chest, usually. Remember it — that's the feeling we're going to try to extend. [pause for 20 seconds]
Someone neutral
2 min 30[matter-of-fact; the point of this one is that it has no charge at all]
Now someone neutral. Somebody you see but don't know — a person from the bus, someone who works in a shop you use, a neighbour you nod to. Somebody whose life you know nothing about at all. [pause for 20 seconds]
They have a whole life you've never thought about. Someone waiting for them, or nobody. Things they're worried about this week. [pause for 15 seconds]
May you be safe. May you be well. May you be at ease. May you live with kindness. [long pause — 45 seconds]
Someone difficult
3 min[careful and unhurried — give the permission line real weight, don't rush past it]
Now someone you find difficult. Start small — mildly irritating rather than genuinely harmful. Somebody who gets under your skin, not somebody who has hurt you badly. [pause for 20 seconds]
And if there's someone your mind keeps offering up who you're not ready to do this for — don't. Wishing someone well is not the same as excusing them, but you don't owe this to anybody, and skipping it isn't failing. Go back to the neutral person if you need to. [pause for 20 seconds]
When you're ready. May you be safe. May you be well. May you be at ease. May you live with kindness. [long pause — 45 seconds]
Everyone, and closing
1 min 30[widen the voice out with the circle, then bring it back to normal for the last two lines]
Now let it widen. Everyone in this building. Everyone on this street. The whole town, the people asleep and the people working. [pause for 20 seconds]
Everyone, everywhere, without exception. May you be safe. May you be well. May you be at ease. May you live with kindness. [pause for 40 seconds, then lift the voice]
Let the phrases go. Come back to the room, the chair, the sounds around you.
And when you're ready, open your eyes. See if the first person you meet today gets any of that.