I often notice that when people try to cultivate kindness or compassion for someone they find challenging, they tend to do it in a pretty vague manner. Usually, during their meditation practice, they just picture the “enemy” and repeat phrases like “May you be well” and “May you be free from suffering.” That’s what I was taught, and it’s what most people learn to do.
So, what’s wrong with this? The issue is that when we have problems with people, it’s their behaviors—the things they say and do—that really bother us. These behaviors are what trigger our reactions. When the person in our mind is just peacefully sitting there, it doesn’t really bring up the discomfort that causes us to get annoyed. We need to create some discomfort to learn how to handle it without reacting. We must put ourselves in situations where reacting is likely so we can recognize the early signs of anger and choose not to fuel it.
I prefer to teach loving-kindness and compassion meditation as ways to practice facing real challenges. When you think of a “difficult person” during these meditations, it’s more effective to focus specifically on what they say or do that triggers you. If you remember or imagine these actions vividly, you’ll likely stir up uncomfortable feelings, which in turn trigger your reactivity. In the mindful space that meditation provides, you get the chance to sit with those uncomfortable feelings and observe them. You can see your anger arising and choose not to encourage it but let it go instead. It’s also an opportunity to remember the humanity of the person in front of you and to foster an attitude of kindness toward them.
I was reflecting on this recently in the context of the civil rights marches of the 1960s. When I first learned how Martin Luther King’s marchers endured insults, beatings, water hoses, and dogs without retaliation, I was astonished and humbled. How could they withstand such abuse when I get upset over small online insults?
Later, I found out that these activists trained themselves to be non-reactive to violence. They practiced. They gathered in groups to role-play facing insults and attacks so they could learn non-violent responses. They reframed encounters with the police, viewing arrest and imprisonment not as violations but as honors to be worn with pride. Their goal was not to humiliate their opponents but to win their trust and understanding and to convert them to nonviolence. They understood that the enemy was the ideology of oppression, not the individuals committing injustices.
These courageous individuals didn’t just suddenly become capable of such acts of love in the face of hatred; they trained for it step by step. This made me realize that we can learn to perform seemingly extraordinary acts of nonviolence through practice.
If they could practice love while being physically assaulted and insulted, surely we can manage with the smaller irritations in our own lives? I suggest turning your meditation practice into a form of rehearsal. Do you get annoyed when a household member loads the dishwasher poorly or doesn’t clean up after themselves? Or when someone ignores or belittles you? Visualize these scenarios clearly, allow the irritation to arise and sit with it without reacting. If angry thoughts or impulses come up, let them go. Connect with kindness as you envision these annoying actions. Practice responding lightly, with humor, and with full sensitivity to the other person as a vulnerable human being.
This approach also applies to compassion meditation, where we train ourselves to be loving and supportive in the face of another’s suffering. It’s easy to think of someone and remember their suffering, but that’s not very challenging. Buddhist monk Mathieu Ricard once described how he imagines suffering during meditation. For instance, he visualizes a friend seriously injured in a car accident, lying by the roadside at night, far from help. This powerful image evokes strong feelings.
Ricard suggests imagining different forms of distress as vividly as possible until they become almost unbearable. The goal isn’t to make ourselves suffer, but to develop a compassionate response that supports and protects the person suffering. Compassion is heart-warming, nourishing, and loving, and it helps insulate us from sinking into suffering ourselves.
However, it’s important to stretch our capacity to bear suffering gradually. If we can’t respond to suffering with kindness and compassion, we may become overwhelmed, which won’t help anyone.
In summary, our meditation practices will lead to slow change if we don’t challenge ourselves. By vividly imagining situations that provoke us emotionally, we give ourselves a chance to significantly grow our kindness and compassion. As demonstrated by the civil rights marchers, it’s possible to develop remarkable levels of love and compassion through training.