Insight Meditation 21

To develop a tendency towards sympathetic joy within your mind, begin by developing present contentment within yourself, then happiness for the success of someone close to you, as this is the easiest way to access sympathetic joy.

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• 60 min, 1-2 times daily plus actively encouraging the feeling in daily life.

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Meditation is practiced in a seated position.

Step 1: Develop contentment within yourself.

Sit down comfortably, make a half smile on your face and develop a feeling of contentment within yourself by establishing joyful presence within your body. 

Meditation 04: Skill in Joyful Presence.

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Step 2: Develop happiness for the success of a loved one.

Now bring to mind someone you love or respect, reflecting on specific aspects within their life that they have been fortunate, either in the physical world, or spiritually within meditation.

• Picture their happiness at these fortunes and successes.
• Picture placing your arm around their shoulders and sharing in their happiness.
• Smile into the feeling of this shared happiness.

Gently repeat:

1. “(insert their name), may you continue to have happiness ........”
2. “May you continue to be successful ........”
3. “May you always have success and ease within your life ........”

Pause between each phrase to create space for the shared happiness to grow.

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Step 3: Use the pleasant feeling for access concentration.

Once you are proficient at generating the feeling of shared happiness you should now stabilise it so that it can be used as an object for developing access concentration and pleasure jhana. 

Use the instructions offered in Insight 19: Condition Loving Kindness for more detail.

In this Meditation you take the foundation of shared happiness developed towards your loved one to recondition your relationship of jealousy or envy towards difficult people within your life.

You do this by first generating the shared happiness with your loved one before bringing a difficult person to mind directing the feeling of shared happiness towards their success. This may bring up some resistance causing the feeling of sympathetic joy to fade. 

You then develop a feeling contentment within yourself through joyful presence, then regenerate the feeling of shared happiness with your loved one, strengthening the feeling before going back to the difficult person. You repeat this formula until you feel shared happiness for the success of others while maintaining a stable feeling of contentment within yourself.

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• 60 min, 1-2 times daily.

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Meditation is practiced in a seated position.

Step 1: Develop contentment within yourself.

Sit down comfortably, make a half smile on your face and develop a feeling of contentment within yourself by establishing joyful presence within your body.

 ..........

Step 2: Develop happiness for the success of a loved one.

Generate a feeling of shared happiness on an image of a someone you care about until the feeling becomes strong and stable. It can be helpful to imagine you both together, sharing the happiness of their success.

Gently repeat:

1. “(insert their name), may you continue to have happiness ........”
2. “May you continue to be successful ........”
3. “May you always have success and ease within your life ........”

Pausing between each phrase to create space for the shared happiness to grow.

 ..........

Step 3: Develop happiness for the success of a difficult person.

Transfer the feeling of shared happiness generated, to the image of a person you have a difficult relationship with. If the feeling of shared happiness fades, then swap back to your loved one again to re-cultivate the feeling. 

Then apply the generated feeling of shared happiness to the difficult person again until you can arouse the shared feeling equally between all of you.  

Gently repeat:

1. “(insert their name), may you continue to have happiness ........”
2. “May you continue to be successful ........”
3. “May you always have success and ease within your life ........”

Pausing between each phrase to create space for the shared happiness to grow.

 ..........

Step 6: Use the pleasant feeling for access concentration.

Once you are proficient on generating the feeling of shared happiness you should now stabilise it so that it can be used as an object for developing access concentration and pleasure jhana 

Use the instructions offered in Insight 19: Condition Loving Kindness for more detail.

You are ready to progress to Insight 22: Condition Forgiveness when:

• You are comfortable in using the feeling of shared happiness generated by this technique as an object to establish access concentration & pleasure jhana.