Meditation Master Sharon Salzberg On Real Love & The Art of Mindful Connection

“You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.”

Sharon Salzberg

We all yearn for connection, yet often feel trapped by our sense of isolation, anger, or envy. But there is a key that can free us from this prison of despair.

Love.

The problem? Love is just hard to talk about. Harder to understand. And perhaps even harder to practice.

How we get it? How we give it? How do we attract it? How do we cultivate it?

To answer these questions, first we have to define it.

What is love, exactly? 

Ask Sharon Salzberg and she’ll tell you that it’s not an emotion we should be trying to extract from another. In fact, don’t even think about love as a feeling at all. Instead, consider it as an ability. An aptness or facility that resides within all of us that can be cultivated to create real, profound connections with others, with all, and most importantly ourselves. And it is that connection that will nourish the very sustenance of life itself and ultimately set you free.

Today I sit down with Sharon to redefine our limited interpretation of love. To dispel the misunderstandings that confine and circumscribe it. To plumb the eternal truths within it — love based on direct interactions rather than preconceptions. And to explore how we can better cultivate and expand our experience of real love in our daily lives.

For the uninitiated, Sharon Salzberg is a towering figure in the field of meditation. A world-renowned teacher and multiple New York Times’ bestselling author, she has played a central, crucial role in bringing meditation and mindfulness practices to the West and into mainstream culture dating back to 1974 when she first began teaching. She is the co-founder of the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, MA and the author of ten books, including the New York Times bestseller, Real Happiness*, her seminal work, Lovingkindness* and her newest release, Real Love: The Art of Mindful Connection* (the focus of today’s conversation). Sharon is also a regular columnist for On Being, a contributor to Huffington Post, and the host of her own podcast, The Metta Hour.

One of the many striking things about Sharon is that she’s just cool. Like, really f*$king cool. Despite her undisputed luminary status in the meditation space, conspicuously absent is any hint of pretense or artifice. Down-to-earth and fun to be with, her approach to Buddhist teachings is modern, secular, and accessible, rendering the wisdom and it’s practical applications relatable to all.

This conversation is a deep dive into Sharon’s extraordinary life. It’s about the reoccurring abandonment and incomprehensible trauma she endured as a child — and how she ultimately found salvation, and her life path, in meditation.

It’s a discussion about how we think about and practice love – love for others, love for all, and love for one’s self.

It’s about unconscious pain and the inherent value of suffering when recognized and properly channelled.

It’s about the three most essential life skills – compassion, mindfulness & concentration – and how meditation can help us master them by training our attention.

And it’s a conversation about the imperative of navigating these treacherous, divided times with fierce compassion and unabated loving kindness.

It was an absolute blast spending a couple hours with Sharon, and I think you’ll really love (pun intended) the product of our exchange.

Peace + Plants,