Sentient beings are numberless; I vow to liberate them.
Delusions are inexhaustible; I vow to transcend them.
Dharma teachings are boundless; I vow to master them.
The Buddha’s Enlightened Way is unsurpassed; I vow to embody it.

The Four Immeasurable Minds are loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity. Typically, we are taught to begin the practice with meditation on loving-kindness. But, Patrul Rinpoche in his Words of My Perfect Teacher stresses the need for meditating on equanimity first because this removes the danger of having partial or biased love, partial or biased compassion. When we begin on the path, there is a strong tendency to have stronger love towards those we like and lesser love towards those we don’t like. Once we have developed wisdom with this meditation, it becomes true love, which cares for each and every person without any bias. This is the purest compassion because it cares for everyone.

We meditate first to cultivate impartiality or equanimity, then we go on to meditate on the others, and thereby develop bodhicitta. Equanimity means not being influenced by attachment or aggression (cultivating the heart that does not dwell in aversion). Loving-kindness means wanting everyone to attain happiness. Compassion means wanting to free everyone from suffering. Joy means rejoicing in the success and happiness of everyone, delighting when sentient beings are in peace and happiness. Bodhisattvas are not jealous of the sentient beings’ achievement. They regard the achievement of the sentient beings being the same or even better than that of their own. Bodhisattvas have the immeasurable mind of joy. So the chant is said in this way:

May I dwell in equanimity free from attachment, aggression and ignorance. May I attain happiness. May I be free from suffering. May I rejoice in the success and happiness of all beings.

As we sit, we begin by thinking of ourselves first, chanting these aspirations for our own freedom, then we think of our loved ones, the neutral person–some one we see frequently but don’t know really–then, our benefactor or mentor, the difficult one,  and then all beings everywhere. We can go through all of the “categories” in one sitting or practice with each one for as long as it takes for the wish to become genuine. We could even say this spontaneously when we see someone or hear of someone who is suffering and needs energetic and spiritual support. However this practice is done, it will certainly be beneficial to us, and to those we think of with loving-kindness–metta.

Pema Chodron wrote, “Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It’s a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.”

From Sylvia Boorstein’s book Pay attention for goodness sake. I have really needed the wisdom she offers in this paragraph lately. I keep coming back to it day after day.

“…when I am so shaken by events that I forget what I thought was firmly installed in me as Wisdom—when I suffer… I give myself time for the floodwaters to subside, for the confusion to sort itself out, for my mind to clear. I try to remember that I used to know. Or that my teachers, whom I love, know. Or that the Buddha—indeed, all the wise figures of all the great spiritual traditions—knew. Or, in fact that all of us in our best moments also know. When we are relaxed and reasonably content, we are naturally wise. We accept that life is unpredictable, unreliable. We say jokingly or philosophically, “Nothing is sure except death and taxes,” or “God willing and the creek don’t rise,” reminding each other that, notwithstanding the level of planning, we are continually dealing with being surprised. We get startled. We recover. We are disappointed. We adjust. Mostly—with Wisdom intact—we manage. When we are seriously challenged, though, when something happens that we so badly did not want that we can’t bear to have it be true, we forget philosophy. Wisdom vanishes. We ask, “Why me?” or, “Why now?” The pain we feel about what has happened intensifies with bitterness—which we often cannot help but feel—and we suffer. Then, in a moment of Wisdom—“It is me. It is now. It is painful. And it will be painful for as long as it is, and then it will change”—the suffering stops. The heart’s natural compassion becomes available to provide support, to comfort the pain.”