Loving-kindness meditation usually gets introduced as an emotional exercise, a way to feel warmer toward people, including people who are hard to feel warm toward. This guided loving-kindness meditation for resentment asks for something more modest and more specific: offering the same few words to yourself, to someone easy to love and, only if you are ready, to someone who has been a friction in your life, without needing to feel anything in particular while you do it.
The practice runs about ten minutes. Below you will find how it works, what three studies on loving-kindness did and did not measure, the Buddhist teachings behind it, a step-by-step way to try it, and answers to the questions people most often have when the “difficult person” round feels like too much.
What Loving-Kindness Meditation for Resentment Actually Asks of You
Resentment is a weight that is easy to pick up and surprisingly hard to put down. It often arrives with a replay: the conversation, the comment, the thing that should have gone differently. A loving-kindness practice does not argue with the replay. It adds one small, repeatable action next to it: silently offering a short set of wishes, such as “May you be safe, may you be at ease, may you be free from this weight.”
Three things make the practice workable when the feelings are mixed:
- You start close to home. The first round is for you, which gives the practice a steady base before anyone harder arrives.
- You choose someone small. The video says explicitly: not the hardest person in your life, but someone smaller, an annoyance or a friction. That keeps the exercise within reach.
- You do not have to feel it. The words are an offering, not a promise about how you should feel. The video says the feeling can come later, or not at all today, and that there is no version of this you can get wrong.
It also helps to be clear about what the practice is not. Offering good wishes is not saying what happened was fine, it is not reconciling, and it does not require you to contact the person. The video puts it simply: you are not saying it was okay, you are setting down what was never yours to carry.
What the Research Says About Loving-Kindness Meditation
No trial we know of studies this exact ten-minute practice for resentment, so it is worth looking at what the nearest studies did and did not test.
A field experiment over weeks. In a 2008 study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Barbara Fredrickson and colleagues tested 139 working adults, half of whom were randomly assigned to begin a practice of loving-kindness meditation. Results showed increases over time in daily positive emotions, which in turn were linked to increases in personal resources such as mindfulness, purpose in life and social support, and to decreased illness symptoms. Those increases in resources then predicted greater life satisfaction and fewer depressive symptoms. The study followed a practice repeated over weeks, not a single session, and it did not test resentment.
A few minutes with strangers. A 2008 study in Emotion by Cendri Hutcherson, Emma Seppala and James Gross used a brief loving-kindness exercise in a laboratory. Compared with a closely matched control task, a few minutes of loving-kindness meditation increased feelings of social connection and positivity toward novel individuals, on both explicit and implicit measures. That is a short exercise aimed at strangers rather than at someone who has hurt you, but it speaks to how quickly the words can shift attention toward others.
Anger in a clinical sample. In a 2005 pilot trial in the Journal of Holistic Nursing, James Carson and colleagues randomly assigned 43 people with chronic low back pain to an eight-week loving-kindness program or to standard care. The loving-kindness group improved in pain and psychological distress, and day-to-day data showed that more practice on a given day was related to lower pain that day and lower anger the next day. It was a small pilot in a specific patient group, the authors call the results preliminary, and anger was one of several measures.
The honest summary: these studies point to repeated practice and to a link between loving-kindness and positive feelings, connection and, in one small sample, less anger. They do not show that a ten-minute session will resolve a resentment, and none of them is a treatment for anger or for the effects of being hurt. If a hurt is deep, recent or still happening, a therapist is a good partner for it.
One more thing the first study suggests is practical: the benefit appeared across weeks of practice, not from any single sit landing perfectly. That matters for the difficult-person round, where discomfort is normal and does not need to be talked away.
The Buddhist Source Behind Loving-Kindness Meditation
Metta, usually translated as loving-kindness or goodwill, is taught in the Karaniya Metta Sutta (Sutta Nipata 1.8), one of the most widely recited texts in Buddhist practice. In Thanissaro Bhikkhu’s translation, it compares the practice to a mother who would protect her only child with her own life, and asks us to cultivate that same limitless heart toward all beings.
The sutta itself does not lay out a step-by-step order of who to include first. The familiar order of starting with yourself, then someone easy to love, then someone difficult is a way teachers later organized the practice, and it is the order this video follows. Starting close to home and moving outward gives the practice something to build on, but that is a teaching convention rather than a rule from the sutta.
The second teaching worth knowing is Dhammapada verse 5, in Thanissaro Bhikkhu’s translation: hostilities are not stilled through hostility; they are stilled through non-hostility. Read as a practice instruction, it says that the weight of resentment is not lifted by more resentment, and that goodwill, offered in small doses, is the other direction to go. Connecting that verse to this video’s ten-minute exercise is this video’s way of practicing, not something the verse prescribes.
How to Practice Loving-Kindness Meditation for Resentment, Step by Step
Find a spot where you can be still, sitting or lying down, whatever your body wants. Let your eyes close if it feels okay, or let your gaze rest somewhere soft, low and unfocused.
- Settle. Take a breath in and let it go a little slower than it came. One more like that. There is nothing to fix, just breathing exactly as it is.
- Start with yourself. Silently say: “May I be safe. May I be at ease. May I be free from this weight I have been carrying.” If the words feel far away, saying them is enough.
- Someone easy to love. Let a person come to mind whose face makes something in you soften. Offer the same three lines: “May you be safe. May you be at ease. May you be free from this weight.” Notice how that felt, with no need to do anything with it.
- Only if you are ready, someone smaller who has been hard. Choose an annoyance or a friction, not the hardest person in your life. You might feel your chest tighten, and that tightness is allowed to be there. Offer: “May you be safe. May you be at ease. May you be free from this weight, too.” Not because they have earned it, and not because what happened was fine, but because you are the one who has been carrying the weight.
- If the words stick, make them quieter. You can say them more softly or just think the shape of them.
- Picture the weight as something physical. A stone, a closed fist. On your next exhale, let your hand open, even slightly. Take one more breath like that and let the fist open a little further on the way out.
- Let a few words settle. “I can keep my own peace, even near people who are hard. I don’t have to carry resentment to stay safe. My heart can be soft and still be strong.”
- Close. Take one more full breath and, whenever you are ready, let your eyes open gently. The video ends with: “May you be well. May you be happy. May you live in peace.”
You can stay at the second round for the whole practice if the third feels like too much, and return to it another day. If memories become overwhelming, stop, open your eyes and rest your attention on the room around you.
Common Mistakes and Tips for Loving-Kindness Meditation
- Picking the hardest person first. Save the most painful relationships for much later. Choosing someone smaller keeps the practice open rather than shutting it down.
- Waiting to feel something. The words matter more than the feeling, especially early on. The feeling may catch up with repetition, or it may not, and both are fine.
- Treating it as forgiveness on a deadline. You do not have to forgive anyone to practice. Setting down the weight is separate from deciding what to do about the person.
- Forcing the phrases to sound sincere. Plain words said quietly are enough. If a line rings false, shorten it to “may you be well.”
- Skipping yourself. The first round is part of the practice, not a warm-up. If you find it hard to wish yourself well, stay there as long as you like.
- Expecting one sit to settle a real resentment. Repeat the practice with the same person over days or weeks and notice which round felt easiest and which hardest. That is useful information, not a grade.
- Pushing through distress. If it brings up more than you can hold, stop. Support from a therapist is a good idea for deep or recent hurts.
Loving-Kindness Meditation for Resentment: Common Questions
Do I have to forgive the person?
No. The practice does not ask you to say that what happened was okay. It offers a way to put down the weight you are carrying about it.
What if I feel nothing?
That is common and fine. The words are the practice, and the feeling may come later or not at all.
What if I feel angry or sad instead?
Those feelings can come up. Let them be there, return to your breath, and stay with the earlier rounds or stop if it is too much.
Can I skip the difficult person?
Yes. Stay with yourself and someone easy to love for as long as you like. You can try the harder step another time.
Why start with myself?
Starting close to home gives you a steady base before you bring in someone harder. It also reminds you that you are part of the circle of kindness.
Is it okay to choose a person I am still in conflict with?
Choose someone small, an annoyance rather than a deep wound. If the person is currently harming you, your safety comes first, and this practice is not a substitute for protecting yourself.
Does loving-kindness meditation reduce anger?
One small pilot trial found lower anger the day after more practice in people with chronic back pain, as described above. That is preliminary, and this video does not claim a result for you.
Can I use different words?
Yes. Many people adjust the phrases. What matters is that they are kind, simple and something you can say without strain.
How long does it take, and how often should I practice?
The guided practice is about ten minutes. The research above looked at practice repeated over weeks, so returning to it regularly is more useful than waiting for one perfect session.
For a practice of kindness aimed at yourself rather than at others, see self-compassion meditation: the voice you use with yourself, and for a gentler way to meet strong feelings in the body, try the body scan meditation.
This guided meditation and article are part of the Learn library at Buddhism with Maitreya Dharma, where modern neuroscience and the Buddha’s teachings meet in practical, everyday language — no background in Buddhism required.
