Cattāri Brahmavihārā

I have been listening to a series of guided metta meditations by Ajahn Achalo of late and am impressed not only with his methodical approach to the topoc but by his willingness to use different meditation techniques (meditation word, visualization and even Buddhanussati). And then, of course, is the fact that one gets the sense that they are listening to a teacher who is profoundly concerned with one’s welfare.

There are many things which intrigue me about the metta methods taught by Ajahn Achalo but the one feature in particular that stands out as unique to his approach is the idea that we need to cultivate loving-acceptance with the breath before we even move onto radiating loving-kindness to ourselves. The way the venerable ajahn describes it, metta has a dual natur with loving-acceptance being the cool, rceptive aspect (the yin if you will) and loving-kindness the active, warmer quality (the yang). If this has been previously presented elsewhere I have missed it but it changes the way I will be practicing the brahmaviharas and I will be extending my formal sit time to a minimum of 45 minutes simply because the process of settling in takes a good half hour. I will be posting the link to the meditations shortly but I encourage everyone to look the ajahn up in the interim. Sukhi hotu!