Mother of Protection Sphere Meditation
Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ
You can call on Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ for protection. In the meditation that follows, you learn to surround yourself with egg-shaped spheres of colored light. Each sphere protects you from external harm, strengthens an important internal quality, and helps you develop the ability to help and shield others, as Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ and other great mothers do. As you will see, each color represents a wisdom quality of mind – peace, abundance, power, precision, and activity – and helps you develop these qualities for yourself and to aid others. After generating the light spheres, you embody and inhabit each sphere by allowing yourself to be held and nourished by the loving protective qualities of each of the spheres.
Take Refuge and Setting Our Intention for Bodhicitta
Sit comfortably with your back upright. Pay attention to your breathing in and out, following the natural rhythm. Now visualize Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ in front of you. If you don’t have a picture of her, that’s okay. Simply have a feeling of the ultimate, loving, mother. And if you have had bad experiences with mothers, then imagine having a mother that sees you, understands you, nourishes you, and nurtures you into growing to be whatever you can be with complete love and the capacity to hold that space for you. That is Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ. Now feel Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ there with you with her wonderful attributes and take refuge:
With a wish for all beings to be free,
Free of the constriction caused by held belief systems and thought patterns,
Free of the automatic reactivity of learned emotional patterns,
And free of distorted perception,
I will always go for refuge
To alive, vibrant, radiant, spacious, awareness
Until awareness is ongoing like the flow of a river.
Enthused by wisdom and compassion,
Today in the presence of all Buddhas and Bodhisattvas
In the past, present, and future
Of any lineage or none
I generate the mind for full Awakening
for the benefit of all beings.
As long as space remains
As long as beings remain
may I manifest in such a way
to ease and dispel the miseries in the universe.
The White Crystal Protection Sphere
From Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ’s heart, crystal white light starts to radiate. The light enters you and fills your body completely. As it does, it clears all physical illnesses and energy blockages and drives away all negative states of mind and troubling emotions. All of your internal difficulties and problems disappear, as the rising sun dispels the darkness. You become clear and peaceful.
Then the white light that is still streaming from Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ’s body starts to pour from your body as well. With you and Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ at the center, this white light begins to form an enormous egg-shaped white sphere that surrounds you both completely at a distance of six body lengths. Though the sphere is shaped like an egg, it is not at all fragile. It is very strong and very stable. By creating this sphere, you begin to develop the capability to bring clarity and peace to others.
The Golden Yellow Protection Sphere
Now, the white light streaming from her into you takes on a buttery glow, until it becomes a yellow-orange color, almost like liquid gold. The crystal white light has cleared and pacified you. Now the golden yellow light can do its work of rejuvenating you.
As the golden light fills your body, it brings with it prosperity and abundance. It rejuvenates your strength and your life energy and builds the vitality you need to accomplish your goals, both material and spiritual. It helps you to appreciate the richness of your life and to understand the way things really are. And it helps you to apply these insights to the choices you make every day.
The golden light now streams from you and from Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ. It passes through the crystal white sphere, and six body lengths further out from that, it forms a completely new golden yellow sphere. Creating this sphere helps you to be more open-handed and more generous with what you have. Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ knows exactly what you need in this moment and gives you what you need. Feel that you have enough.
The Red Coral Protection Sphere
Now, in your mind’s eye, you see both you and Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ surrounded by a crystalline white sphere and, outside of that, a golden yellow sphere. Both of these spheres are sturdy and resilient. Even a hurricane could not destroy them. The golden light streaming from Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ to you has started to pick up a reddish-orange color, like the color of radiant coral.
This red-orange light carries the energy of power and creativity – not power over others, such as political power or military power, but rather power in the sense of energetic passion, creativity, and capability. Whether what you want to do is resolve a thorny life problem, complete a project, or overcome some setback or obstacle, the red-orange light fills your body with the feeling “I can do that!” It makes you capable of helping yourself in whatever way you need – to end an unwholesome habit, take steps to improve a troubled relationship, or carve out more time in your busy day to relax or to meditate. Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ showers you with the creative energy to make wholesome changes in your life. To create whatever you need to create for yourself and for others.
Now the red-orange light of power starts to stream from your body as well. In your visualization, you see the light pass through the white sphere and the yellow sphere, and six body lengths further out, form an egg-shaped reddish-orange sphere. Creating this sphere gives you the capability of using your passion and your power to help others.
The Sapphire Blue Protection Sphere
You generate the blue sphere using the same method. You visualize yourself and Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ in the center of the three concentric spheres – the white sphere of peace and clarity, the yellow sphere of prosperity and abundance, and the red sphere of energetic power and creativity.
Now you see that the fiery red light coming from Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ has blue tips, as flames sometimes do. Soon, the light changes to a jewel-like sapphire blue. The energy of this light is very sharp and precise. As it fills your body, it disciplines your mind and gives you a clear perspective, so that you know exactly what’s wholesome for you and what is unwholesome.
If someone asks you to do something and you don’t want to do it, the blue light helps you say “no” clearly and make that “no” stick. Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ showers you with the strength and insight to draw clear boundaries when needed and to stand diligently in your intentions and aspirations.
Now the sapphire blue light starts to pour from you as well. Traveling out form your body and from Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ’s, it passes through the white sphere, the yellow sphere, and the red sphere, and six body lengths further out, creates a blue sphere, made of light, but strong and stable like the others. Visualizing this sphere gives you the ability to use your sharp mind to stay aware of your aspirations for life, and to help others see alternatives and resolve conflicts no matter how big or small.
The Emerald Green Protection Sphere
Take a moment to see yourself in your mind’s eye. You and the beautiful Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ are sitting in the midst of four jewel-like spheres of protection. Not only that, but you are filled with peace and clarity, prosperity and abundance, energetic passion and creativity, and sharpness and discerning precision.
Now see that the light coming from Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ starts to turn from blue to emerald green. As it fills your body, you gain the power of activity – the ability to accomplish anything you want without rushing or worrying. If your life is like most, you’re probably juggling too many activities: a job or school, a relationship or partner, friends and interests, meals to cook and a home to take care of, kids or pets or both, and trying in the midst of that to have a spiritual life and time to relax. The emerald green light gives you the ability to multitask – to do the million things that make up your life without rushing or stressing over them. As the light pours from your body and passes through the white, yellow, red, and blue spheres to create a green sphere, you gain the wisdom of accomplishment, so that you are able to do things to help others as well.
The Rusty Protection Sphere
As a final step, you visualize a rust-colored sphere. Its job is to make the entire set of concentric spheres stable. First, reflect on your experience. You are sitting as you see yourself. In front of you is Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ, with all her wonderful qualities. Surrounding you both at a distance of six body lengths is an enormous crystal white sphere, made light but strong and stable. Six body lengths further out is an even larger golden yellow sphere. The spheres are egg-shaped, so that you are completely encircled by them. Six body lengths outside the yellow sphere is a coral red sphere. At the same distance outside that is a sapphire blue sphere, and outside of that, an emerald green sphere. The measure of six body lengths between the spheres is to give you the sense that the set of concentric spheres is enormous.
Now, let’s add one more detail. The spaces between the light spheres are completely filled with lotus flowers. The lotus symbolizes your apiration for enlightenment out of the mud of suffering. Though these look like ordinary flowers, the lotuses between the spheres are actually powerful weapons. If something dangerous tries to approach you, it will be cut to bits by the flowers’ deadly thorns.
You generate the rust colored sphere using the same method. You see that the green light coming from her begins to pick up some yellow, until it becomes a rusty color. As the light fills your body, any insights and spiritual qualities you have gained by doing this meditation become completely manifest and stable. The light streams from you and passes through each of the spheres – the white, the yellow, the red, the blue, and the green – and at a distance of six body lengths further, forms a rust colored sphere that gives you the ability to bring protection, security, and stability to others.
Rest solid and free steeped in these protection spheres in the energy of the Mother, Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ for as long as you can. Relax, and let your body and mind rest and be held by Mẹ Sanh Mẹ Độ. There is nothing left to do.
Finally, when you are ready dedicate the merit. As you say the words below, you are sending the positive energy of having engaged in this meditation to everyone in the world, without a single exception, so that they may feel all of these wholesome qualities of love and protection.
May any benefit generated by our practice today
Be shared equally with all whom we encounter,
Whether near or far away,
And may it’s effects ripple continuously
To aid in the healing and transformation of the world.
When you practice this meditation on your own, feel free to spend as much time on any sphere that you may need. Or you can choose to focus on a single sphere if that is what you find you need.