WHAT YOU NEED FOR YOUR PRACTICE:
1. Minimum 10 minutes of your precious time. Alone and undisturbed.
2. A journal.
3. Love and patience.
4. Optional: Maitri Aroma Formula (you can use another formula or an individual essential oil of your choice).
5. Optional: Higher Self, Sacred Lotus or your Custom Flower Essence Formula.
This short human life that you are experiencing is your opportunity. Think about how you want to use this time. The purpose of Maitri meditation is not to get rid of anything, but to be steadfast with ourselves, developing more explicit awareness and becoming honest about who we are and what we do. Meditation is a patient process of knowing that gradually, over time, everything is changeable, "figuroutable", and habits are dissolvable.
Practicing Maitri is about making friends with yourself. It means seeing everything inside you and not running away, abandoning, or turning your back on yourself. Just as you wouldn't give up on a best friend who's darker side began to show up.
Rather than letting this be something to feel wrong about, you can discover who you are at your wisest and who you are at your most confused. You get to know yourself in all your aspects: at times completely sane and openhearted and, at other times, completely messed up and bewildered. We are all at times, a basket case. Meditation allows you to get to know yourself in all those aspects. Judging ourselves for how our practice is going or what might be coming up for us during meditation is a kind of subtle aggression toward ourselves.
When I became friends with my body, my mind, and my transient emotions, I was able to settle into myself more and more comfortably. And then staying in the present moment, in all situations, became more possible. It didn't happen overnight, it took time, and I continue the practice.
When you are staying present despite the temporary discomfort or pain, and see your emotional trigger and conflict, you can observe your reaction: to fight, flight, freeze, or fawn, to numb, to dissociate, to distract, to punish, to freakout.
In basic sitting practice, we befriend ourselves, and we cultivate Maitri (unlimited friendliness) toward ourselves. As the days, months, and years of meditation practice pass, we also find that we're feeling more and more compassion, understanding, and acceptance towards others and the world itself.
In basic sitting practice, we befriend ourselves, and we cultivate Maitri (unlimited friendliness) toward ourselves. As the days, months, and years of meditation practice pass, we also find that we're feeling more and more compassion, understanding and acceptance towards others and the world itself.
1. Find a safe, quiet space where you will not be disturbed. Get comfortable: turn off the phone, close the door to get privacy, use the bathroom, and hydrate yourself. Think about what else makes you more comfortable in your body.
2. When you are ready, light up a candle or incense, anoint the pulse points and chakras with Maitri Aroma Formula (you can use another formula or an individual essential oil of your choice).
Optionally, you can choose to take a flower essence (Higher Self is a great choice) that brings clarity and helps you connect to Higher Self, your ancestors, Spirit Guides, or Angelic Realms.
3. Ground yourself. Slow down the inhalation and exhalations. Feel your fit on the ground, the support of Mama Earth, and your connection to it.
4. Sit on the floor or the chair quietly with closed eyes or gaze over the tip of your nose.
5. Set an intention and mentally take a vow of non-judging. Then ask yourself:
How was my day?
In which situations I was my most brilliant empowered self?
In which situations I acted stupidly or not as myself? Observe, note and immediately release the judgement.
Was I greedy or generous?
Was I slow or fast?
Was I angry today? Who triggered me? Whom did I trigger? Are there any situations or conflicts that need to resolved? Can I see both sides in this conflict?
How is my Inner Child Doing? Can I feel her or him or am I disconnected?
Was I acting impulsively today or overreacted? What part of me is still hidden in the Shadow?
Are you loving or judging yourself right now?
6. Identify your Physical state and your Earth Element: are you tense or relaxed, is there pain, tension, or another uncomfortable sensation in the body? Is this sensation chronic or a temporary condition? Focus on the area of a feeling and observe which memories, words, associations, or emotions arise. Remember and record in your journal.
7. Identify your Mental/intellectual Condition and Air Element: what are your thoughts, worries, and what is on your mind overall. Is there a specific thought or phrase that keeps playing on repeat? Are you trying to solve a problem without having enough clues? If you can't calm a racing mind - do seven rounds of alternative nostril breathing without opening eyes and then continue the Maitri Meditation.
8. Identify your Emotional state and Water Element. What emotions or emotions you are experiencing, what caused it? Is it present, or is it an echo of what happened a long time ago that was triggered by a recent event? How long have you been experiencing the emotion? Is a recent one or you had been stuck within this emotion all day? Is it your emotion, or you picked it up from somebody else in your environment?
9. Identify your Spiritual Wellness and your Fire element. Feel your connection to the earth underneath you and the Universe above and all around you. Tune in to your intuition. Does it have any messages for you?
10. Now, say out loud:
I LOVE AND FULLY ACCEPT ALL ASPECTS OF MY BEAUTIFUL, UNIQUE SELF.
I AM AWARE OF MY LIGHT AND DARK SIDES. I ACCEPT ALL, I REJECT NONE. AND SO IT IS.
10. Journal your insights and keep a diary of daily check-ins.