How Love and Compassion lead to Happiness (with guided meditation) | Meditate with Rishi

Book a call with me - www.meditatewithrishi.com

🌸 What is Love and Compassion? | Meditation with Rishi 🌸

Namaste and welcome! It’s Rishi here from meditatewithrishi.com. In this video, we’re diving into the true meaning of love and compassion—concepts that, when fully understood, can completely transform the way we experience life.

At our core, love and compassion are our true nature. When we connect with these qualities within ourselves and see them in others, we can transform our relationships, overcome negative emotions like fear and anxiety, and find a deeper sense of harmony.

In this video, I explore: ✨ The Buddha's definitions of love and compassion:

Love is the wish to be happy.
Compassion is the wish not to suffer.
We can hold these feelings for ourselves, and we can hold them for others. But according to the Buddha’s teachings, the idea of "self" and "other" is an illusion. At the ultimate level, we are all one—one awareness expressing itself in many forms.

Just like the ocean creates waves as expressions of its beauty, our awareness manifests in all forms of life. While we appear as separate individuals, we share the same fundamental nature—the wish to be happy and free from suffering.

💡 The Problem
We forget this oneness and prioritize ourselves over others, or sometimes others over ourselves. Both extremes cause imbalance:

Self-cherishing leads to strained relationships where my happiness becomes more important than yours.
Self-neglect can lead to resentment and inner turmoil.
The solution lies in equalizing our understanding: recognizing both our own desire for happiness and that others share the same desire. When we balance these perspectives, we create harmony within ourselves and our relationships.

🧘‍♂️ The Solution: Meditation Meditation allows us to connect with our true nature—our natural mind. Starting with practices like awareness of breath and body (Shamatha), we rest in calm abiding. But there’s also a more direct way to nurture love and compassion: compassion meditation.

In the second part of this video, I’ll guide you through a meditation where we mentally recognize our wish to be happy and not suffer, and extend this recognition to others. From the food we eat to the actions we take, everything we do is an expression of love and compassion.