This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video Guided Meditation: Continuity of Goodwill; Love (29) Metta Samadhi. It likely contains inaccuracies, especially with speaker attribution if there are multiple speakers.

Guided Meditation: Continutity of Goodwill; Dharmette: Love (29) Metta Samadhi - Gil Fronsdal

The following talk was given by Gil Fronsdal at Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, CA on February 19, 2026. Please visit the website www.audiodharma.org for more information.

Guided Meditation: Continutity of Goodwill

Hello everyone, and welcome. We continue now with the meditations on metta¹ (goodwill). There are two things I would like to emphasize today that are the support for developing metta samadhi², which means to be immersed in the experience of metta, of goodwill. I worded it that way—to be immersed in the experience—so that we don't put too much emphasis on our personal role in doing the practice, focusing, and engaging. We have to offer our effort, for sure, but there's something more going on here. We're beginning to attune ourselves, or immerse ourselves, in the byproduct: the sensations, the feelings, the experience of becoming gathered, centered, and steady. Settling in and being able to really allow the pleasure of goodwill meditation to begin spreading and filling us, so that it becomes, at some point, all-pervading.

There are two things that contribute to us becoming immersed, becoming really fully absorbed and engaged in metta. One is the attitude that we have in doing the practice. Before I say what that might be, I want to give an analogy. When my older son was quite young, he was in preschool. We had a wonderful preschool that had a little bit of a spiritual, Dharma orientation. I had occasion to visit sometimes, and I visited one day when all the preschool kids were napping. Immediately, when I realized that, my attitude—my way of being there—shifted. I became very quiet, very attentive to not making any noise. I did it with a feeling of tremendous love, tenderness, just very attuned and immersed in the beautiful quiet of these kids sleeping, who normally are running around making lots of noise. I knew how important it was for them to have a nap. I knew what happens when our son, at least, didn't get enough of his nap, and the consequences were sometimes challenging for us.

So I changed my attitude. I was there with a tenderness, with a quiet, with a kind of love, taking in the atmosphere, taking in the stillness. I shifted how I was, maybe similar to how, in the old days, we would shift how we were if we walked into a library. Of course, we change. So, there's a changed attitude when we're going to do metta. We want to become quieter. We want to become more gentle. We want to be in such a way that we don't wake up the napping hindrances³ that might be there—the napping, or close to napping, aversions we might have, or complaints we have about life.

And then, to have an attitude of love. We have to offer something. We have to offer attention, steadiness, centeredness. We have to offer the goodwill in some way, bring it up as we do it. But can we do it almost as a way of offering love? Some people might say, as if you're loving yourself. Or as if you're speaking to and have an attitude towards someone that you love a lot. Maybe you have a small child you're putting to sleep, and so there is the love of speaking to them, helping them go to sleep at night.

Shift and change. Don't come in to do metta meditation with the same way of talking to yourself and being with yourself as you normally would, coming straight off a busy life. Be ready for a shift of attitude: an attitude of goodwill, an attitude of tenderness, of gentleness, of care. Like you're really caring. That's one.

The second is to have continuity. To have a steadiness. To be steady through time. Just stay close. Stay close. In the same way that you would keep your hand on the steering wheel as you drive without ever taking it off, you don't ever take yourself off the steering wheel of metta.

The steering wheel of metta—that which we keep the focus on—will vary from person to person. But it's some focal point, something at the center of it all. Not the whole thing, of course; the steering wheel is not the whole experience. When we drive, we're aware of the car and the environment around us, but we stay steady on the steering wheel. And so for metta, if there is a feeling of kindness, stay connected continuously. Don't take your hands off it. If it's phrases of loving-kindness you're making, or a simple word—"kindness," "love," "metta," or "may you be happy, peaceful"—the voice that lovingly says that, wishes that, that's the steering wheel we stay with.

It might be the pleasure associated with goodwill. At some point, there might be some pleasure of sitting in meditation, getting centered, getting quiet, and there's some kind of pleasure that's there. So that's the steering wheel. Stay steady with the pleasure. Just flow with it.

For some people, one way to do this is to also stay with the breathing. Maybe there's a steering wheel and there's the column that holds the steering wheel; they're connected. So you stay with the breathing. Breathe with the focal point. Breathe with the steering wheel. Breathe through it. Every breath helps that continuity. The continuity only lasts the inhale, only allows the exhale. Kind of like you're petting a cat; it only lasts how long you have your hand on the cat. Or like pushing a scooter, where you push the scooter and then you just allow yourself to feel the momentum until you need to push again. So the breathing is like petting the cat or like the gentle pushing of a scooter, to be here with the steering wheel of metta.

So those two things: attitude and continuity.

Guided Practice

So, assume a meditation posture. And gently close your eyes.

Take a few moments just to be here. Nothing to do, nothing to be, nothing required except allowing yourself the benefits. Maybe the pleasure of just being here as you are.

Maybe with a loving curiosity: How are you now? And see if you can shift your attitude to be one of kindness, gentleness. Allow yourself to be as you are, but in connecting to it, knowing it, have an attitude of care. As if you're meeting yourself, as if you yourself or your experience here is someone you love. And maybe you don't have to love yourself, but as if you do, shift the inner attitude and inner voice in how you are present for yourself.

And to whatever degree you can have a kind, metta-ful attitude, have that go through every effort you make. Everything that you do. Starting with taking a few fuller inhales, and longer relaxing exhales.

Letting your breathing return to normal.

And then for a few rounds, gently, lovingly wish yourself well: "May I be happy."

Or if it's easier to connect to metta, offer it to another person that you know, that's easy.

As an alternative to how many people live their lives without much love, without much metta, spending some minutes now focusing on goodwill is a very beneficial, healthy thing to do.

Where is the center point, the steering wheel of metta for you? Is it in the well-wishing words? Is there someplace in the mind, in the heart that smiles? Is there some pleasure in the body, mind, or heart associated with metta?

And then somehow coordinate breathing with your metta. Breathing with the focal point, the steering wheel. Breathing through it. Connecting to that steering wheel with the inhale, and then again with the exhale. Having a steadiness, a continuity.

For now, this is all you're going to do. Anything else falls away to the side. Keeping your attention on the central point of metta, the steering wheel, the intention, the attitude, the pleasure. Breathing with it, with every breath. Dipping into the whole experience. The whole way in which metta is a wide, broad experience of body, mind, and heart.

As we come to the end of the sitting, stay with your breathing. Breathing with whatever pleasure or glow or feeling there is that you associate with metta.

As you would drive a car on a freeway, you wouldn't take your hand off the steering wheel or your focus off the road, but you could also be immersed in the whole experience of the natural world around you. The road. Maybe you are going through an area where there's a lot of forests that open up into a wide vista, and now you're immersed in the whole experience of driving with the vista. So with metta, staying with your hand, your mind, your attention on whatever is the focal point for metta, allow yourself now to enter into some sense of the wider world. Expanding the boundaries of awareness to become boundless, going out and spreading across the world, wishing all beings well.

May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free.

And may we carry goodwill with us through our day. Thank you.

Dharmette: Love (29) Metta Samadhi

Hello and welcome to this continuation of talks about Buddhist practices of love. This week it's the samadhi of metta, of goodwill. Samadhi is a state of absorption or meditative immersion in this goodwill, so that there's not much else going on for us. We're not distracted, we're not preoccupied with other things. More and more, all of who we are, including the basic attitude in which we are with ourselves and our experience, is associated with goodwill—or the variations of it depending on what you prefer: goodwill, love, kindness, loving-kindness, or friendliness.

It's possible to have that become the overall atmosphere, the overall attitude in which we're operating and being in. It's quite something to dip into that and have that be the fullness of our experience. That is possible, which meditators can discover. That's true with most meditation: we discover we don't have to be fragmented or distracted. We don't have to be stuck in reactive attitudes, because those are extra work. Those are tension, and as the tension falls away, the extra work falls away. We tend to be left with this simplicity of being.

This simplicity of relaxed being tends to be one where there's more care, more kindness, more gentleness, more peacefulness in which we meet and be with experience. That becomes a place for the growing of a natural goodwill. But it's possible to keep cultivating it and focusing on it, so it really becomes the place that concentration takes hold. We get absorbed and focused on the experience of goodwill. It's a remarkable thing to have that begin happening, and to make it more and more part of what we do in our life. We learn so much this way about what is extra, what is the extra work, and what are the attitudes we don't need.

To really get into these deeper experiences of metta meditation, there are different touchstones or aspects that are helpful for being able to dip down and put aside the distractions and preoccupations we have. One is to change the attitude we have, to recognize what attitude you're coming with into the meditation. Some people have default attitudes that they live their lives with. Some have a variety that come through. But there might be an attitude of aversion—just not liking things—or overwhelm, or anxiety, or a sense of "shoulds" and needs, and a sense of maybe not being right or being inadequate in some way. These default attitudes sometimes are almost subconscious. We don't even know they're there, but they're always in the way we think, the way we feel, the way we walk around. Sitting down to meditate, sometimes we discover that we carry attitudes with us which are not healthy for us, which are not pleasant or enjoyable.

To the degree to which it's possible, we do two things in mindfulness practice: we allow it to be there in order to know it well, with the idea that as we really get to know it well, the mindfulness itself is another way of being. It's not caught in it. We have a mind with aversion, we have a mind with anxiety, we have a mind with desire and inadequacy. We don't define ourselves by it, we don't allow it to define all of who we are. We realize it's a visitor, in a sense.

But when we do metta meditation, what we're looking for is to shift our attitude. To shift our attitude to one that offers a positive regard to our experience, to the world, to ourselves. Then this positive attitude is something that goes in all directions. Some people find it easier to cultivate with oneself, some people with other people. Some people more generally, without having even an object, just a feeling of goodwill. So, to consciously be able to shift the attitude is an important part of this.

A reference point that might be helpful is to think of someplace in your life where you go, where you happily or easily or naturally shift the attitude in which you're there. You're more careful, more quiet, more attentive—like going into a library where everyone's quiet. Consciously see what we can do in an easy, simple way: shift the attitude to one of goodwill, of kindness, of care, of gentleness.

Then see what we can do to bring forth our natural capacity for goodwill, even if just a little bit, and to see where and how is the focal point for that goodwill. For some people, it's the words they say: "May you be happy, may you be safe, may you be peaceful and free." Something about the way they say those words, a little bit like a mantra—they say it in a loving way, they say it in a kind way, and staying with those words somehow soothes and cultivates that feeling of goodwill.

For some people, the touchstone or the steering wheel that we hold onto is a general feeling. For some people, that general feeling has a sense of pleasure. There's a kind of pleasantness. Some people might call it a kind of delight or smile, but a pleasure of goodwill.

For some people, the touchstone where we keep our central attention is the breathing itself. The breathing itself begins feeling like it's completely part of goodwill. It's integral to it. So we stay with the breathing, feeling the goodwill.

So there are words, there are attitudes, there are feelings, there are pleasures. There's something that we can gather ourselves with or stay close to, and with the breathing, kind of breathe through it, breathe with it. Stay here; here is where we dip in. Here is where we dip into the wonderful pool of water, the water of metta. Here is where we touch in. Here. Stay. Stay.

Of course, the mind will wander off. Of course, distractions will come up. When we're doing metta meditation, it's important to be able to relate to those distractions in kind ways, in friendly ways. Not to evoke aversion or disappointment, the feeling of "I can't do it." Have a kind way, say, "No thank you, don't need to do that, not now, thank you." And then, without any aversion, maybe with a delight, recognize that the very turning back into doing the metta meditation is an act of metta, an act of kindness. Dipping in, dipping in.

As the distractions begin becoming quieter, as they don't get fed and reinforced, there's more energy, more attention, more fullness that can go into just doing the metta meditation. Staying with it, staying with it. With time, the feelings, the pleasures, the sensations, the whole experience of it becomes stronger and fuller. We're able to get more and more immersed in it. With every breath, we can allow ourselves to become immersed, allow ourselves to dip into that path to feel it and be in it.

I'm trying to put down some of the foundational aspects that are needed for doing metta. For some of you, maybe this is relatively new. Those of you who want to do more of this, I'd encourage you to practice another sitting each day where you're just left alone to do this on your own. 20 minutes, 30 minutes, just following up with the instructions here. I realize very much how much I'm instructing and teaching at this time, and some people prefer much more silence. Probably I would too, but this is a trade-off. I'm hoping that with this foundation of putting it down and explaining it well, some of you will begin to get a real sense of this, and make it your own.

Once this foundation is put down, we'll continue this to have metta samadhi next week, but then we'll have more time to just practice it quietly as a culmination of what I'm teaching so far.

So, thank you very much, and I look forward to continuing tomorrow and next week. May it be that you are coming to a greater and greater appreciation of your own capacity for goodwill, that it nourishes you, supports you, and is beneficial for the world you live in, and the people you know. Thank you.