METTA FOR INSOMNIA:
A tool for anxious nights
This essay was originally published in The Hard Prune on 4th April 2025.
Many of us are having trouble sleeping these days.
We ruminate. We spin in anxiety spirals. We have bad dreams.
A number of years ago, while going through a period when I felt the walls of the world closing in, I worked out that I could use a practice I’d learned in meditation to calm my nighttime agitation and help me get to sleep. This practice is called metta.
Metta is a Pali word that means love. It’s most often translated as lovingkindness, to distinguish it from romantic love. Metta, along with equanimity, compassion, and joy, is one of the four heart practices the Buddha taught.
Many of you may be familiar with metta meditation as it is typically practiced. You take a series of statements wishing good things for people. Things like these, which are the statements I usually use: May you be safe. May you be healthy. May you be peaceful. May you live with ease. Other people prefer longer or more flowery sentences. May you be safe and protected. May you love and be loved. May you be free from fear. May you dwell in peace. I tend to use shorter statements because, as I say each one in my head, I like to match it to my breath.
In conventional metta practice, you repeat each of these statements in your head, cycling through them, as you bring a different person to mind. First yourself, then a loved one, then a neutral person, then a difficult person, and then all beings. For each person, you might cycle through the statements five times or so, before you bring the next person to mind.
The way I suggest using metta in the middle of the night is different.
For insomnia, I suggest lying on your back with one hand on your belly and the other on your chest. This is a very comforting position. It’s like when you put a loving hand on someone’s shoulder, only you are putting that loving hand on your own heart and centre. Then slowly repeat the phrases you’ve chosen to yourself, beginning each with “May I…” instead of “May you…” May I be safe. May I be healthy. May I be peaceful. May I love and be loved. If you need to, keep your phrases written down on a slip of paper on your bedside table until you memorise them.
It is not necessary to feel anything in particular, or anything at all!, when you are doing this. It can be nice if your heart softens, but often the words just feel like words. Chances are, your thoughts will continue to roam as you say the phrases. You might find yourself thinking, “What am I even doing. Is this going to work? I don’t think this is working. I feel silly. I’m still awake.” That’s just fine.
What you’ll notice is that you are giving your mind something to do. It’s good for busy brains to have a task; simply having a focus can settle things a bit. You can also say to yourself, “This may not work, but at least I will have spent the next hour saying nice things to myself!” This is what I usually end up saying to myself. . . shortly before I finally doze off.
For bad dreams, I recommend something slightly different. Most bad dreams make us feel unsafe in some way. We can feel threatened, fearful, pursued, at risk, confused, disconcerted and/or unlike ourselves. To use metta as a remedy for the acute discomfort of bad dreams, I suggest just using the first of the phrases. I am safe. I am safe. I am safe. This reminder can be tremendously reassuring. (And if you aren’t able to say I am safe and believe it, try May I be safe instead.)
If you share your bed with someone, you might also reach over and put one hand on their arm or back, noticing the texture of their pjs or temperature of their skin, to ground yourself in reality outside the dream world.
Whenever and however you do metta, you may wonder how long to pause between each statement. There’s no rule for this, and there’s no wrong way to do it. I know for me, when my mind is very agitated, it’s best not to leave too much room between phrases; a tighter focus allows less space for echoes of a lingering dream to reverberate in. At other times, when the challenge is not an upsetting dream but just a blank failure to sleep, I might pause longer between statements, allowing each to ring like a bell and settle into silence before I move on.
The thing about metta is that, over time, it can be very powerful, even if it doesn’t feel like anything while you’re doing it. In our culture, which does a lousy job of teaching people to love themselves, everyone can benefit from having a metta practice focused on themself. And difficult nights provide a tremendous opportunity.
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