Mindfulness Meditation (For Everyday Life)

Then, in the midst of your anger, as an experiment, if
the person you are angry at is present, try opening
your fists and placing the palms together over your
heart in the prayer position right in front of him. (Of
course, he won't have the slightest idea what you are
doing.) Notice what happens to the anger and hurt as
you hold this position for even a few moments.
I find it virtually impossible to sustain my anger when
I do this. It's not that the anger may not be justified.
It's just that all sorts of other feelings come into play,
which frame the anger energy and tame it - feelings
like sympathy and compassion for the other person,
and perhaps a greater understanding of the dance we
are both in ... The dance of one thing inevitably
leading to another, of the concatenation of
consequences impersonally set in motion, the end
result of which can (mistakenly) be taken personally
and lead to ignorance compounding ignorance,
aggression compounding aggression, with no wisdom
anywhere.
When Gandhi was assassinated at point-blank range,
he put his palms together in this way toward his
attacker, uttered his mantra, and died. Years of
meditation and yoga practice, guided by his beloved
Bhagavad Gita, had brought him to the point where
he was able to bring the perspective of non-