Our 100 Days of Lovingkindness posts

100 Days of Lovingkindness

Starting April 12, 2013, Wildmind began a project called 100 Days of Lovingkindness. The intention was to focus our attention on the important set of teachings and practices known as the “immeasurables” or “divine abidings,” which include:

  1. Metta Bhavana (developing kindness)
  2. Karuna Bhavana (developing compassion)
  3. Mudita Bhavana (developing gladness)
  4. Upekkha Bhavana (developing even-mindedness)

There are 25 days for each of these practices.

Below is a list, in chronological order) of all the posts for 100 Days of Lovingkindness, grouped by meditation practice.

Lovingkindness (Metta)

Introduction: Getting started with lovingkindness (Day 0 of 100 Days of Lovingkindness)

  1. Bringing kindness to mind (Day 1)
  2. Taking kindness to heart (Day 2)
  3. Looking with a loving gaze (Day 3)
  4. Metta-blast to the past (Day 4)
  5. Embodying lovingkindness (Day 5)
  6. Effortless lovingkindness (Day 6)
  7. Struggling with a “lack of lovingkindness” (Day 7)
  8. Learning to see with the eyes of wholeness (Day 8)
  9. “For here there is no place that does not see you. You must change your life.” (Day 9)
  10. Smile your way to kindness (Day 10)
  11. Guardian angel meditation (Day 11)
  12. Kindfulness of breathing (Day 12)
  13. Cocooned in lovingkindness (Day 13)
  14. Speak kindly to yourself (Day 14)
  15. Loving your inner critic (Day 15)
  16. Love letters to strangers (Day 16)
  17. Metta on the go: 6 simple ways to take lovingkindness off the cushion (Day 17)
  18. When you have trouble being kind to yourself (Day 18)
  19. Dealing with guilt and shame (Day 19)
  20. Walking with love (Day 20)
  21. Lovingkindness: when the rubber hits the road (Day 21)
  22. The tender heart of lovingkindness (Day 22)
  23. The expansive mind of lovingkindness (Day 23)
  24. Breaking the boundaries (Day 24)
  25. Lovingkindness as a path to awakening (Day 25)

Compassion (Karuna)

  1. Cultivating compassion (Day 26)
  2. Compassion is inherent to us all (Day 27)
  3. Sorrow is failed compassion (Day 28)
  4. Cultivating self-compassion (Day 29)
  5. Avoiding cruelty, the “far enemy” of compassion Day 30)
  6. What is suffering? (Day 31)
  7. Developing compassion: instructions from an ancient source, plus commentary (Day 32)
  8. How not to practice “idiot compassion” (Day 33)
  9. The Buddha (and his disciples) on compassion (Day 34)
  10. Self-compassion is not selfish (Day 35)
  11. Compassion and causing pain (Day 36)
  12. Guided compassion meditation (karuna bhavana)
  13. Why are we so hard on ourselves? (Day 38)
  14. Compassion can be joyful (Day 39)
  15. Compassion, bliss, and beyond (Day 40)
  16. The science of happiness and compassion (Day 41)
  17. Compassion is not superiority (Day 42)
  18. Bearing compassion in mind (Day 43)
  19. Seeing with the eyes of compassion (Day 44)
  20. Compassion as an antidote for our own suffering (Day 45)
  21. Living with a heart of tenderness (Day 46)
  22. Dealing with resentment (Day 47)
  23. Compassion and impermanence (Day 48)
  24. An awareness imbued with compassion (Day 49)
  25. There is no one to have compassion, no one to have compassion for (Day 50)

Bonus compassion post: “Perhaps everything terrifying is deep down a helpless thing that needs our help.” Rainer Maria Rilke

Appreciative Joy (Mudita)

  1. Cultivating appreciative joy (Day 51)
  2. “To believe in the heroic makes heroes” Benjamin Disraeli
  3. The conscious evolution of appreciation (Day 53)
  4. “May good qualities and happiness continue and increase” (Day 54)
  5. There’s a crack in everything (Day 55)
  6. Seven qualities that science says make us happy (Day 56)
  7. Accepting compliments as a spiritual practice (Day 57)
  8. Flooding the body with gratitude (Day 58)
  9. Aversion: the far enemy of joyful appreciation (Day 59)
  10. The “near enemy” of mudita, or joyful appreciation (Day 60)
  11. Learning to see the good in others (Day 61)
  12. The power of gratitude (day 62)
  13. Appreciation is contagious (Day 63)
  14. The pursuit of happiness (Day 64)
  15. Mudita Bhavana (Joyful Appreciation) guided meditation, led by Bodhipaksa (Day 65)
  16. There’s more right with you than wrong with you (Day 66)
  17. The “magic ratio” of appreciation (Day 67)
  18. Looking deeper for the good qualities of others (Day 68)
  19. Innate purity versus original sin (Day 69)
  20. Having gratitude for our enemies (Day 70)
  21. An antidote to fear (Day 71)
  22. Look in the mirror. What do you see? (Day 72)
  23. Appreciation and impermanence (Day 73)
  24. “A person of integrity is grateful and thankful” — The Buddha (Day 74)
  25. Gratitude for the teachings and teachers (Day 75)

Bonus mudita meditation: Guided meditation on mudita (joyful appreciation)

Bonus mudita book review: The power of appreciative words: “Mishan’s Garden,” by James Vollbracht & Janet Brooke

Even-Mindedness (Upekkha)

  1. Cultivating equanimity or evenmindedness (upekkha) (Day 76)
  2. Guided Upekkha Bhavana (Cultivating Evenmindedness) (Day 77)
  3. Equanimity is love — even-minded love (Day 78)
  4. Even-mindedness and the two arrows (Day 79)
  5. “There is never any need to get worked up or to trouble your soul about things you can’t control.” Marcus Aurelius (Day 80)
  6. Equanimity’s “far enemies” (Day 81)
  7. The “near enemy” of even-minded love (Day 82)
  8. The still, spacious, and vibrant mind of equanimity (and how to get there) (Day 83)
  9. Words of equanimity; wordless equanimity (Day 84)
  10. Upekkha as an insight practice (Day 85)
  11. Acting with equanimity (Day 86)
  12. Radiating peace (Day 87)
  13. The big turn-around (Day 88)
  14. There’s nothing to hold onto; there’s nothing to do any holding on. (day 89)
  15. Five remembrances for deep peace (Day 90)
  16. “May all beings dwell in peace”: A guided meditation (Day 91)
  17. Looking into the heart’s depths (Day 92)
  18. Lay your burden down (Day 93)
  19. Where the currents of construing do not flow (Day 94)
  20. This is not me; this is not mine, I am not this (Day 95)
  21. The play of causes and conditions (Day 96)
  22. Going all the way… (Day 97)
  23. Cultivate only the path to peace
  24. Knowing the mind of the Buddha
  25. 100 days of lovingkindness (and compassion, and joyful appreciation, and loving with insight
Bodhipaksa
Bodhipaksa has been meditating since 1982 and teaching since around 1989. He is a Buddhist practitioner and teacher, a member of the Triratna Buddhist Order, and a published author. He launched the Wildmind website on November 11, 2000. Bodhipaksa has published many guided meditation CDs, guided meditation MP3s, and books. He teaches in various meditation centers around the world. He is supported by donations from members of the Wildmind community. If you're interested in becoming a supporter and in getting access to more of Bodhipaksa's teachings, please click here to learn more about his meditation initiative.

14 Comments. Leave new

  • Srivandana
    May 14, 2013 10:32 am

    Fantastic! This is a great resource and I hope one day, a book!

    Reply
  • Catherine
    June 24, 2013 5:35 pm

    I second Srivandana’s comment – I would love to be able to buy this as a book and really linger over each day’s readings :-)

    Reply
  • Bodhipaksa’s 100 Days of Loving Kindness | Pranna Blog
    July 25, 2013 2:01 pm

    […] https://www.wildmind.org/100-days […]

    Reply
  • Maitri
    August 18, 2013 5:57 am

    hi, my name is Maitri which also translates to metta or loving kindness. Thanks for writing this, looking forward to read this :)

    Reply
  • Chris
    April 26, 2014 3:26 pm

    Is it possible to purchase the 100 days of loving kindness emails in PDF? I would like to repeat the 100 days as I have dipped in and out and now want to settle into it in a more committed manner

    Reply
    • Bodhipaksa
      April 26, 2014 3:30 pm

      Hi Chris. I’ve been editing the posts into an ebook as I’ve been going along. It won’t be very polished as a piece of literature, but it’ll work on Kindles, iPads, etc. There will also be a PDF version. I’m not sure how we’re going to distribute it yet. There won’t be a charge but donations would be welcomed.

      Reply
  • Chris
    April 27, 2014 4:22 pm

    Thank you so much, I will definitely make an appropriate donation for the PDF – I am not on Kindle or I Pad – resisting changing technology until I have to :) but a PDF would work well for me. Thanks for sharing your wisdom and knowledge.

    Reply
  • Meredith
    March 15, 2015 8:35 pm

    Hello,
    I’ve just started the 100 days of lovingkindness and a few days into it I was no longer able to access the list of blog posts. It seems the link to the list from this page has broken. Could you please tell me where to access the 100 posts?

    Thank you so much for your work with this,
    Meredith

    Reply
    • Bodhipaksa
      March 15, 2015 11:29 pm

      Apologies! My mistake — I disabled a plugin that I thought wasn’t in use, but which in fact was generating the list on this page. It’s been restored and you should have no problem accessing the posts now.

      Reply
  • Lizzy
    September 25, 2018 3:27 am

    Unfortunately I cannot access the full list, I managed to find some of the posts via google but got stuck on day 11. Can you please enable the list again? Thank you

    Reply
    • Bodhipaksa
      September 25, 2018 9:59 am

      Sorry about the list being disabled. I managed to restore it, so you can now visit those posts. I should say though that over the years since I did this event my understanding of the brahmaviharas has moved on considerably. Hopefully you’ll still find this useful though.

      Reply

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