This week’s meditation session is led by Sharon Salzberg and the theme is Kindness. The guided meditation begins at 15:39.

In Tibetan Buddhist culture, those who are unable to read are instructed to spin a “wheel” filled with thousands of inscribed mantras, or mani, written on paper tightly wrapped around a central pole inside a cylinder that encases them. It is believed that turning the wheel is the same as reciting the prayers and mantras, leading to the accumulation of merit and wisdom while purifying negative karma for a practitioner; it also releases these mantras into the world, benefitting countless beings.

Believed to go back to the famous Indian master Nagarjuna, this common practice is usually accompanied by vocal recitations of mantras and often combined with circumambulation around a sacred site or temple. The wheels are spun clockwise so the mantras inside can be read correctly, from left to right.