Meditation: Sending loving-kindness to those impacted by disaster
Seeing suffering up close or from afar can be difficult. Here's how to work with these experiences.
To hear
another’s voice,
follow
your own voice,
wait until
that voice
becomes an
intimate
private ear
that can
really listen
to another…
Start close in,
don’t take
the second step
or the third,
start with the first
thing
close in,
the step
you don’t want to take.
— , “Start Close In”
Earlier this week, a fire broke out in Los Angeles that continues to blaze on, uncontained. Nearly a million people are without power. Thousands of buildings have been destroyed. This is a history-shifting event.1
My partner and I both have close friends who live in L.A. and we are deeply concerned for their welfare. (They are currently safe, thank goodness, and staying with friends and family.)
That said, my practice as a meditator is also to bring awareness to this sense of “my people” and “not-my-people,” and to cultivate more of what Buddhist author Pema Chödrön calls “a love with no reference point.” A love that functions like an aerial drop of water over a burning blaze, bringing relief to all who fall underneath, regardless of their backgrounds, belief systems, or close personal connection to me.
Bearing witness to those who are impacted by natural disasters can offer all of us this opportunity. And yet I know it can be overwhelming to consume distressing images and words 24/7, as we are invited to do by cable news networks and social media feeds. I don’t recommend this.
Instead, the skillful means I reach for in moments like this is mettā practice, also known as loving-kindness meditation.
Mettā on the mat
Mettā or loving-kindness practice is often associated with Buddhist meditation, though the idea itself appears to be an heirloom Buddhism inherited from Hinduism.2 In the West, it has been widely popularized by teachers such as Sharon Salzberg3, who literally wrote the book on it.
Mettā practice looks different for everyone, but there are typically a few traditional elements to it when taught during these modern times.
First, you “start close in,” as David Whyte has it.
You find a comfortable space to sit, begin to breathe gently in and out, and then, when you feel ready, you begin to offer well-wishes to yourself, or to another being who feels close to you and easy to love, like a beloved grandparent, a child, or an animal.
Typically one will say a few phrases that take the form of “May you _____.”
Some examples that resonate with me include:
May you be safe.
May you know peace.
May you know happiness and freedom.
After that, you can offer specific well wishes to others who are not so close to you — for example, strangers impacted by disaster.
As Tim Desmond, a Buddhist teacher and therapist, says:
I sometimes think of this practice in terms of fighting a fire: at this point, the client knows how to open the faucet; now it’s time to learn how to aim the hose.
So, we might bring to mind someone who is fleeing their home — perhaps with a beloved grandparent, child or animal of their own. We can offer to them the same well wishes.
May you be safe.
May you know peace.
May you know happiness and freedom.
These two elements — love for self and other, specific phrases that serve as vehicles for that love — define how my practice looks and feels on the mat.
Mettā off the mat
This practice also helps me consider how I might show up in the world with more compassion. Especially in situations where it feels hard to stay grounded, or to discern how I can be most helpful.
With natural disasters that are far away from us geographically, it is often sadly not possible for us to stop the suffering directly — to bring a home-cooked meal, for example, or to house a person or pet who has lost their home.
But like trees outside of the blaze who send in nutrients to suffering neighbors via the underground mycelial web, we can send offerings to organizations who do have the capacity to respond more directly. To discern how we might allocate our financial resources, if we have them, we might again ask ourselves:
What will help keep people safe?
What will bring peace?
What will create the conditions for happiness and freedom?
Right now, safety for LA’s residents is key. The Red Cross is currently working to establish these conditions in L.A. According to ABC news:
The American Red Cross has hundreds of volunteers deploying to Los Angeles to assist with emergent needs of those displaced by the fire. The agency currently has four shelters in place and plans to add more as needed, according to Los Angeles regional executive director Joanne Nowlin.
In 2024, I also worked with the organization World Central Kitchen, which serves meals to people impacted by disasters all over the world, and will continue my giving relationship in 2025 to support suffering Angelenos as well. You can view footage from WCK detailing the damage and WCK’s planned response here:
Finally,
of hipped me to this inspiring mutual aid spreadsheet yesterday via his beautiful post on this topic. Mutual aid, as opposed to fundraising, is truly about helping your neighbor rather than engaging in top-down “charity” — which is what loving-kindness is really all about. A relationship between equals. A love without a reference point.4If your own loving-kindness practice calls you to contribute to any of these organizations, you can do so here:
» Donate to the Red Cross
» Donate to World Central Kitchen
» Check out Mutual Aid LA’s Accepting/Donating Spreadsheet for current asks
» This GoFundMe for Emeka, his family, & their family-owned music shop and community center gofund.me/0866d780, and this one for Christina and Corrina families gofund.me/646e2da0, via Angeleno .
Per Hillary: “Emeka and his family and their store are a vital part of Altadena’s Black community and music scene, Christina and Corrina are preschool teachers and sisters who live in an intergenerational home. ❤️”
May you too be safe today. May you be peaceful. May you be happy. And may we all remember this week that when it comes to climate-related disasters, we are all in this together.
Further reading:
Learning the truth of grief from trees: on how trees care for friends who are impacted by fire
Receiving love from my Mother Trees: on how our family was cared for after our own life-altering disaster, which taught us much about how to do the same for others
Contemplating spaciousness, through smoke: on how New Yorkers weathered an unexpected fire season last summer, and the toll it took on the caregivers in my life
The Red Thread that connects us all: on how the expansive Korean concept of in yeon changed the way I think about love
Your turn: How do you typically respond to the news of natural disasters far from home? Is loving-kindness meditation already part of the way you bear witness to others’ suffering, or was this new information for you? What other organizations do you think are doing good work when it comes to bringing safety, peace and/or happiness to those who are suffering from the impacts of disasters? (I’m happy to add these to the list!) Please drop a comment below. You can also respond directly to this email if you prefer, and I’ll do my best to answer.
Source: https://ktla.com/news/california/wildfires/palisades-fire-thursday-live-updates/
Source: https://encyclopedia.pub/entry/27828
If you’d like to explore more of Sharon Salzberg’s guided meditations on loving-kindness, she has many available for free on Insight Timer: https://insighttimer.com/sharonsalzberg
This part of the post is not in the article voiceover because I recorded the audio before finding this resource, and then I had to go and make dinner. Such are the human limitations of this newsletter. I’m hoping to continue to add more resources as events unfold, so there may be additional points at which the audio does not overlap with the text in this section. Thanks for understanding!
Thank you for sharing the Gofundme’s. Sending love ❤️