Listen or subscribe in your favorite player:

About this meditation

In his guided meditation on nonviolence, Kazu Haga takes you through a journey of self-compassion and loving-kindness, helping you let go of anger and foster a deep sense of inner peace, self-love, and of course, love for others. Haga, a renowned nonviolence and restorative justice trainer, combines analytical meditation, visualization, breathwork (breathing exercises), and mindfulness meditation to address feelings of anger and other strong emotions.

Throughout the meditation, Haga emphasizes that loving-kindness, metta, is key for transforming angry thoughts, anger issues, frustration, and other negative emotions. In this meditation practice, he encourages listeners to experience anger, without feeling the need to control anger or release anger, but rather to sit with it and feel grateful for the lessons it presents. By taking deep breaths and feeling grateful for all the feelings that bring discomfort and growth, Haga helps you cultivate a headspace that is open, welcoming, and loving.

This meditation practice is beneficial for well-being and mental health, by calming the nervous system, and acting as a form of anger management that shifts one’s mindset from reactivity to compassionate acceptance for all. It is a sort of meditation for anger, as you witness the negative emotions you feel towards others and how you can let go of anger in a healthy way. This 16-minute meditation is part of a How to Train a Happy Mind’s podcasts playlist of Guided Meditations for Beginners on YouTube.

Meditation on Nonviolence with Kazu Haga #174

Kazu Haga: Just a reminder that nonviolence is a practice, like meditation is a practice, and the more we’re able to practice it, the more our capacity to engage in nonviolence expands.

Think of someone you are in conflict with

We’ll enter a short practice period where we are going to be bringing to our attention a person who we are in conflict with. Not the person who you are in the deepest, heaviest conflict with, perhaps on a scale from one to 10 with 10 being the most difficult conflict you’re in your life, something around a four or a five.

Take a second to think of a person who you may want to engage in this practice with.

Notice the breath

And as you begin to think of someone, I want to invite everyone to settle into their bodies, and to begin to notice your breath.

Notice in each moment where in the cycle of breath you’re in. In this exact moment, are you breathing in? Are you breathing out? Are you at that short transition moment between the in breath and the out breath?

Beginning to feel your body as well, feeling the weight of your body against the chair, the weight of your feet on the ground, the weight of your hands on your knees. Just beginning to settle and to quiet your mind, breathing in spaciousness, breathing out tension, breathing in and breathing out.

Visualization

Now try to invite an image of this person. This doesn’t have to be a person that you know personally. Perhaps it’s a politician who you disagree with. Or a celebrity who has made comments recently you disagree with. Or someone on social media who you have disagreements with.

Whoever they may be, just imagine that person sitting in front of you.

And really invite them into your awareness. Try to notice how they’re sitting in front of you. Noticing their facial features. What are they wearing? How are they looking at you?

And as you notice this person sitting across from you, what do you notice in your own body?

As you sit across from this person, are there any feelings that emerge? Any physical sensations in your body?

Stick with those feelings, stick with those sensations, and see if you notice what these feelings, sensations, may be telling you.

Perhaps you feel some tension because of the conflict you’re in with this person. But perhaps this tension, this feeling is also pointing you to an older wound that you carry or an unmet need.

Whatever it might be, give that feeling, sensation, some space in your body to be present. To welcome that feeling, to welcome that sensation.

As much as this feeling, sensation, may be causing some amount of discomfort, some pain, try to acknowledge that, in some way, it’s actually trying to protect you.

Practicing gratitude

Or to perhaps help you meet an unmet need, perhaps repeating these words, Thank you, Anger, for showing me what’s important.

Thank you, Fear, for protecting me and keeping me aware of possible risks.

Thank you, Frustration, for revealing where I might feel stuck.

Thank you, Sadness, for helping me recognize my longing for connection and belonging.

Thank you, Jealousy, for showing me what I value and aspire to.

Thank you, Doubt, for encouraging me to seek clarity and understanding.

And asking this feeling, if it’s willing to give you just a little bit of space.

You’re not shutting this feeling down, you’re not pretending that it’s not there. If you need to, try making a promise to this feeling, to this sensation, that you’ll come back to it later and give it even more space in your system.

Notice if making that agreement, making that commitment creates a little bit more spaciousness in your body to focus on the person who is still sitting across from you, observing you.

Practicing curiosity

Again, notice this person. As you notice them, seeing if you can invite even the smallest amount of curiosity. Who is this person? Who are they really? Beyond the caricature that I might make of them, beyond the assumptions that I may have, what stories are they carrying that you may not know about?

What pain might they be holding on to that’s driving them? How did they come to believe the things that they do?

Asking yourself if this curiosity does anything to change how you see that person, and if so, how? Asking yourself if inviting this curiosity changes you in any way, and if so, how?

Bringing to awareness that as human beings, each one of us has lived through and continues to live through so much.

That we all have the same universal needs. That everything this person does, in some way, is an attempt to get those universal needs met.

Sometimes people can choose tragic, unskillful, even harmful ways to try to get those needs met.

Cultivating compassion and loving-kindness

Can we cultivate compassion for ignorance? Can we send this person goodwill even as we disagree with what they may be saying or doing?

Noticing this person again, still sitting in front of you.

How are they doing?

How are you doing?

What’s happening between the two of you right now?

Continuing to breathe into the space between you and this person. Breathing in spaciousness. Breathing out tension.

Breathing in. Noticing your body expanding. Breathing out. Noticing your body softening, continuing to breathe into the space between you.

Breathing in and out of the same space, the same air, the same breath. It’s going back and forth between the two of you.

And preparing ourselves for a brief practice of metta, of unconditional goodwill, as we imagine this person looking at you trying to send these words in their direction.

May you find peace and true happiness.

May you be safe and protected from harm and may we find a way to understand each other, and to find belonging in each other.

Now imagine this person looking back at you, saying these words back to you.

May you find peace and true happiness.

May you be safe and protected from harm. May we find a way to understand each other and to find belonging in each other.

Breathing those words in, continuing this exchange with your breath. Breathing in peace, safety, understanding. Breathing out peace, safety, understanding.

We’ll just take a few breaths, a few moments in silence as we continue to breathe in and breathe out.

As we focus our attention on our breath, slowly beginning to expand the focus of our attention throughout our body, noticing any sensations you feel, noticing the weight of your body, the mass of your body. The solidness, the stability of your body.

Also noticing the inner landscape. Taking a moment to notice how you feel, to notice if anything has shifted for you.

A moment of gratitude

Offer yourself a moment of gratitude for engaging in this practice. Or even just a brief moment, working to release any seed of resentment. Knowing that there can still be space for anger, and in fact, you made a commitment to creating more space, coming back to feelings of anger or frustration for disagreement.

But even as we hold space for those feelings, that we can still find connection and understanding.

As we invite the sound of the bell, taking in that sound in through your ears, throughout your entire body, and using that sound of the bell as a tool to allow curiosity, to allow connection, to allow spaciousness to seep into every corner of your body.

When you can no longer hear the sound of the bell, you can gently open your eyes, and bring your awareness back to your surroundings.

Thank you for engaging in this short practice of nonviolence, meditation, and building community. I hope this tool was helpful in you moving one step closer to wholeness.

Credits