Los Angeles Lakers forward Ron Artest, is changing his name to Metta World Peace. This is not suprising, in that many people are now consciously or unconsciously feeling that there is a major shift going on within the Earth.
When I saw this, I wanted to research the definition of Metta. According to Wickipedia, here is one definition of Metta:
Mettā signifies friendship and non-violence, “a strong wish for the happiness of others” and also less obvious or direct qualities such as showing patience, receptivity, and appreciation. Loving-kindness is a very specific feeling — a caring for the well-being of another living being, independent of approving or disapproving of them, or expecting anything in return. Practice includes reciting specific words and phrases in order to evoke a “boundless warm-hearted feeling,” or visualizing suffering and wishing well for those beings. Non-referential compassion, also known as “pure compassion”, involves simply experiencing the feeling of caring for another sentient being. One special technique recommended by Matthieu Ricard is to, “imagine,” the state of another. Richard J. Davidson has shown metta to induce changes in the tempoparietal lobe. Loving-kindness is the application of love to suffering. Metta is applied to all beings and, as a consequence, one experiences another of the sublime states: joy (mudita), which is true happiness in another person’s happiness.
I think this is a great lesson for all of us to practice thinking, saying and speaking kindness and love about ourselves those around us!