Some studies showing the benefits of loving-kindness meditation, a practice that can improve lawyer-lawyer and lawyer-client interactions (even though it has kind of a hokey name)

Readers know I urge lawyers to consider for themselves mediation and mindfulness. But I must admit I wish loving-kindness meditation (LKM) had another name. The name sounds saccharine and kumbaya, and therefore may be, to many lawyers, off-putting. Nevertheless I think the practice of LKM and its benefits to the profession are worth considering and find the research on the practice very intriguing.

The practice is described in the research article "Open Hearts Build Lives: Positive Emotions, Induced through Loving-Kindness Meditation, Build Consequential Personal Resources" [pdf] (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology).

Like other meditation practices, LKM involves quiet contemplation in a seated posture, often with eyes closed and an initial focus on the breath. Yet whereas mindfulness meditation involves training one’s attention toward the present moment in an openminded (non-judgmental) way, LKM involves directing one’s emotions toward warm and tender feelings in an open-hearted way. Individuals are first asked to focus on their heart region and contemplate a person for whom they already feel warm and tender feelings (e.g., their child, a close loved one). They are then asked to extend these warm feelings first to themselves and then to an ever-widening circle of others.

The benefits seem to be many for interpersonal interactions. From the research article linked to above:

Participants who invested an hour or so each week practicing this form of meditation enhanced a wide range of positive emotions in a wide range of situations, especially when interacting with others. We find these data especially promising. LKM appears to be one positive emotion induction that keeps on  giving, long after the identifiable “event” of meditation practice.

And from the reseach "Loving-Kindness Meditation Increases Social Connectedness" [pdf] (Emotion):

In this study, the authors used a brief loving-kindness meditation exercise to examine whether social connection could be created toward strangers in a controlled laboratory context. Compared with a closely matched control task, even just a few minutes of loving-kindness meditation increased feelings of social connection and positivity toward novel individuals on both explicit and implicit levels. These results suggest that this easily implemented technique may help to increase positive social emotions and decrease social isolation.

Sounds like, in the right circumstances and with some open-minded (no pun intended) lawyers,  LKM could facilitate the client-centered practice of law.

Note: Another somewhat related study (on couples) which included the practice of LKM: "Mindfulness-Based Relationship Enhancement" [pdf] (Behavior Therapy).

Image credit: FreeFoto.com.

Comments

[tph]

It sounds like this is what Buddhists refer to as metta meditation. There have got to be other translations of metta that would be more palatable to at least some lawyers. Wikipedia lists nine other possible translations, though I have to admit that most don't just roll off the tongue. But "loving-kindness" does seem to be terminology that a majority of practitioners have adopted.