Transform Your Life with the Power of Loving-Kindness | Meditation Pioneer, Sharon Salzberg

Michael Gervais (0:01)

What do you want for people?

Sharon Salzberg (0:03)

To be happier, it's love. Love is not a feeling, it's an ability. Other people certainly may inspire it, or ignite it, or threaten it, but ultimately it is mind to nurture, to bring forth.

Michael Gervais (0:19)

Welcome back, or welcome to the Finding Mastery podcast. I am your host, Dr. Michael Gervais, by trade and training a high-performance psychologist.

Today, we are thrilled to welcome back to the podcast for the second time, Sharon Salzberg, a world-renowned meditation pioneer and New York Times bestselling author. Nearly 50 years ago, Sharon brought mindfulness and loving kindness meditation to the mainstream in America. Her work has guided millions toward deeper self-compassion and interconnectedness. She co-founded the Insight Meditation Society, and has authored 13 influential books including her latest, Real Life. In this episode, we explore how mindfulness and loving kindness can help us navigate our divided world and create more meaningful connections for all of us. Sharon explains how working from love can drive positive change. The thing is, love isn't just a feeling, it's an ability. And beyond that, possibly a responsibility. This conversation is packed with insights that will challenge and hopefully inspire you to rethink your approach to mindfulness. So with that, let's dive right into this incredible conversation with Sharon Salzberg. Sharon, I am so excited to have you back on the podcast. Our previous conversation is an audience favorite. And when people ask me, like, what is one of your favorite conversations, I definitely point to yours and it was episode 101 And so I'm so excited to be back with you today. And before we dive in, I'd just love to check in, like, how are you?

Sharon Salzberg (2:04)

I'm really well, thank you. I've spent the last four years fairly isolated, actually, because of various health issues. And I'm sort of in an emerging process. This is very interesting.

Michael Gervais (2:19)

Yeah, there you go. Okay. So it's been over six years since we last spoke.

Sharon Salzberg (2:27)

I was going to ask what episode number you up to now.

Michael Gervais (2:30)

Yeah, it's like we're in the 400s. I know six years just flew by. So in our last conversation, we talked about being present. We talked about letting go. You went pretty deep on compassion. And a lot has happened since then.

The world is now wrestling with very different challenges in some respects. What are you feeling? What are you experiencing when it comes to the state of the world right now?

Sharon Salzberg (3:00)

That's a complex question.

Well, in March of 2020, I came up here to Barry, Massachusetts, where I am now. I had spent February just traveling around, teaching as I usually did. I went back to New York City, where I was also living part-time, and the city was just in a very distressing state. People were getting sick. People's parents were getting sick. Anxiety was through the roof, and I had the thought, I'll go up to Barry where I have a house and a retreat center for a couple of weeks, and I'll write it out, and then it'll all be over. And I can just pick up my life as it had been. And some time later, I realized that was not going to happen. The retreat center had to close down, and I was very strictly isolated, teaching only online, and everything was different. Expectations had been shattered, and plans were changed. And the fundamental question I kept asking myself was, what's still true? Like, what am I counting on? What, in the midst of all of this change, and disruption, what do I still trust? What do I believe is kind of an underlying truth? And I really looked deeply at that question, and part of my answer was, of course, my meditation practice, which I'm sure we'll get into. And also my belief, the way the Buddha said it, you know, later echoed by Martin Luther King Jr. and many sage people was, hatred will never cease by hatred. Hatred will only cease by love. This is an eternal law. And in terms of the Buddha, I always thought, well, that's kind of weird, because he talked so much about impermanence and change, and like, this is an eternal law. And not that I find that easy to access in every situation, but I really, really fundamentally believe it's true. And so as I look at the world now, where hatred seems to be on the rise, and there's so much division, and distrust, and people feeling so alone, and all of that, I keep coming back to that, that maybe it's more love, even though it sounds stupid in a way. It's not meant to be saccharine or covering over difficulty, but maybe that's really a path that needs to be followed.