Introduction

I would like to share a simple, but powerful practice, with an amazing potential for healing yourself and others. There are many Tantric practices that utilize the healing power of love, so this is not the only one of its kind. What is special about this one, is that it is accessible to anyone, without any prior experience or esoteric knowledge, and it is still profoundly powerful.

This practice allows you to open up to the universal current of love, through which you can gradually heal your connection with yourself, with other people in your life, and with the Universe itself (you can call it God, or the all-connecting universal principle).

In Tantra, everything and everyone is considered as a doorway to the universal. The main principle of Tantra is that everything is intimately interconnected, and that this transcendental principle of universal interconnection / oneness can be considered as God. The inner conflicts we carry towards ourselves, others and the universe, inhibit the natural flow of loving connections and happiness. This simple practice gradually but powerfully harmonizes these connections, opening you up to an increased loving connection with yourself, others, and the universe / God.

Basic Guidelines

• Make a list of a few people who are significant in your life, or who have been significant to you in the past. When you just start this practice for the first time, a list of 10 people is more than sufficient. (even 3 or 5 will do) In the beginning, it is easiest if you focus on people who you naturally have a nice feeling about. As you get more used to the practice, you can gradually include connections that are more challenging. The only person you must necessarily include in this list is yourself.

• Sit somewhere where you won’t be disturbed. You can do this practice for even just 5 minutes, or for as long as an hour. Have your list of people within reach. (Sitting or even standing is better than lying down, as the relaxation might make you fall asleep.)

• We will do a simple intuitive process with some of the people in your list, starting with yourself. Feel as if you are embracing yourself. Really feel into what it would feel like to embrace yourself. Take a deep breath, and inwardly state the following three things to yourself: “Thank you.”, “I forgive you.”, and “I love you.” Take your time with every statement, really feeling into how saying these statements make you feel. At the end, take another deep breath and feel into the embrace for another moment. (Take about 1 to 5 minutes for this process, depending on your natural flow.)

• When you feel you are ready, move on to another person in your list. You don’t have to do it in the exact order as you wrote them down. Feel into it intuitively who you would like to connect to next. Do the same process with this person: Feel yourself embracing him/her. (If an embrace feels uncomfortable with that particular person, you can also feel yourself sitting or standing together.) Again, state the following three statements to this person: “Thank you.”, “I forgive you.”, and “I love you.” Feel into each statement, and don’t forget to breathe. (Take about 1 to 5 minutes for the whole process, depending on your natural flow.) With a person you naturally feel love for, you will often feel the same love filling your heart as if you were actually having a significant moment with him/her. This feeling of connection and love is very healing for yourself, for this connection, and even for the other person, whether he/she is aware that you’re doing this exercise or not, or even whether this person is walking on this Earth or not.

• Often, due to the conflicts we have inside, embracing or making any of these statements might make us feel a sense of sadness, loneliness, upset, etc. This is part of the healing process. Breathe into these feelings, and try to stay with the feeling, without going into any stories. You will notice that as you do this practice regularly, you will naturally feel more and more love and connection. But there’s no need to create expectations for yourself. If there is sadness in your heart, then that sadness will often have to be authentically experienced before you can let it go. Relax into any sadness in the same way as you relax into any love and connection. We cannot force ourselves to feel love, and there’s nothing wrong with us if we don’t always feel our hearts filled with love. The focus of this exercise is on being authentic with ourselves, whatever is there, and feeling love is merely a consequence.

• There is no need to go through every person on your list. If you feel like it’s been enough for this session, you can gently end the practice. There is no need to push yourself to do this practice to the point where it feels like a drag.
• Take a few minutes at the end to leisurely stretch your body, while staying connected to the way you feel. Breathe.

Additional Guidelines

• When starting out, the statement “I forgive you” might not always make a lot of sense, if you feel like the other person did nothing wrong to you. But the focus of this statement is on your inner feelings of conflict towards this person, and not necessarily on how they potentially wronged you. There might be a person who has never wronged us, but because we had pain in our hearts, we might have projected a subtle sense of blame or criticism onto this person. Stating your forgiveness to this person will harmonize your inner conflicts. If this statement still doesn’t make any sense to you towards a particular person, feel free to skip it.

• You can get creative with the ‘people’ you include in your list. You could include pets and even plants. If you are spiritually inclined, it is very beautiful to include for example God, Jesus, guardian spirits/Angels, etc. Feeling the embrace of God, etc., is profoundly healing, and can lead to a deep state of meditation and love.

• To make this practice even more powerful, let some of the people on your list know that you’re doing this. You can explain it in your own words, or you can share this page with them. For example, you could say or write something like: “Hey Bob, I found out about a nice practice to bring more love to my connections with myself and other people in my life. I thought I’d let you know that I’m sending good vibes to you once in a while!”. If they ask you for more details, you could always send them this page. It may even inspire them to try it out for themselves, and connect back to you in this way! Many people will feel very touched that you aim to have a more harmonious and loving connection with them. Not everyone might be open to this, so feel into it if you want to share this or not.

• You can do this exercise daily, weekly, monthly or yearly as you see fit. Personally, I do it weekly with just a few people / nurturing forces who feel especially significant to me. Once a month, I go through a longer session with a list of about 100 people / nurturing forces. See what works for you. Again, there’s no need to force this practice on yourself.

• Even though this is a practice that you do by yourself, it has a huge impact on your actual connections with these people. You will experience a difference in the way you relate to them. Also, this practice will have a subtle healing influence on the people you do this process with. I will not go into the details of why this is so, and you don’t have to take my word for it. Check it out for yourself. Do this process with someone you want to send love and healing, and see how their situation is subtly influenced.

• As you get more comfortable with this practice, also include a few people who you feel more conflicted about. It’s true that people may have deeply wronged us in the past, but a pure victim mentality keeps us chained in the past. When someone has really triggered us, for the purpose of finding freedom, the fact that we have been triggered ultimately says something about us, and we also hold the power to undo this. Doing this practice with them will not only harmonize your feelings towards these people, but it will generally harmonize conflicting patterns towards yourself and everyone in your life. If someone has really triggered you, it is not necessary to feel yourself embracing the other person, or to state any of the 3 statements, if you have strong resistance against it. In that case, just feel yourself standing in front of him/her, and gently breathe through your feelings.

Feel free to comment below if you have any questions about this practice, or if you would like to share your experience!

About Earth Sky Tantra