If the practice is making things worse, stop. The practice is one limb of a two-limb plan when the state is clinical. Pair this with a qualified clinical therapist if the weather has lasted longer than the threshold named below. If suicidal thoughts are present, contact 988 (US) or your local crisis line today.
Quick Answer
The Wildfire is the inner weather of moral injury and acute anger, heat in the face, jaw set, rehearsed arguments running. Drawn from Salzberg's mettā curriculum and Epictetus's dichotomy of control, the classical traditions ask you to hold the fire without throwing it.
What this weather looks like
The Wildfire is the heat of moral injury, somebody crossed a line, or you crossed your own, and the body is doing the work of registering the violation. The fire is information. The classical traditions do not ask you to extinguish it; they ask you to hold it without throwing it. Loving-kindness in this state is not weakness, it is the only practice old enough to handle the heat.
Somatic markers
- Heat, wherever heat tends to show up in you
- What has braced, and whether it has been braced all afternoon
- Breath that has got short and wants to be heard
- A readiness with nowhere legitimate to go
Cognitive markers
- Rehearsed arguments running in the mind
- Difficulty thinking about anything except the trigger
- Catastrophising the relationship or the offender
- Sense of righteous certainty that the anger MUST be expressed now
The primary practice
In the contemplative literature, this is the single practice the texts agree on for the wildfire. The instruction is short on purpose, the practice itself is the teaching, not the description of it.
Theravada Buddhist (Salzberg / Visuddhimagga)
Mettā for the Difficult Person
Begin with self-mettā, then a benefactor, then a neutral person, only THEN bring the difficult person to mind, and offer the same four phrases briefly: may they be safe, may they be well, may they be at ease, may they live with kindness.
Source
Visuddhimagga IX.40 to 82 (the five categories, self, benefactor, friend, neutral, difficult); Sharon Salzberg, Lovingkindness (1995), ch. 6
Duration
10 to 20 minutes
→Read the full step-by-step instructions
Sit comfortably, and let your hands settle wherever they will stay still.
Begin with yourself. Offer four phrases inwardly: may I be safe, may I be well, may I be at ease, may I live with kindness.
Bring to mind a benefactor, someone whose love has been unambiguous. Offer the same four phrases.
Bring to mind a friend. Offer the phrases.
Bring to mind a neutral person, someone you barely know. Offer the phrases.
Bring to mind a difficult person, only after the previous phases land. Offer the phrases.
Close by extending outward, all beings everywhere, for a final moment.
Secondary practices
When the primary practice is not the right entry-point, or when you want a different shape of work, these are the alternatives the texts agree on for the same weather.
Modern Western contemplative-Buddhist (Brach / McDonald)
R.A.I.N., Recognize, Allow, Investigate, Nurture
Recognize the anger by name, Allow it to be here, Investigate where it lives in the body, Nurture the wound underneath with a steadying gesture.
Source: Tara Brach, Radical Acceptance (2003) and True Refuge (2013) · 5 to 15 min
Stoic
Stoic Dichotomy of Control
Write two columns: what the other person did (not in your control) and what you do next (in your control), the heat narrows when the columns are honest.
Source: Epictetus, Enchiridion ch. 1, "Some things are in our control and others are not" · 10 to 20 min
When NOT to do this practice
Signature breath
The breath is the only thing that lives in the present. Each weather has a signature breath, the pattern the traditions pair with this particular state.
Open the breath timer → for guided pacing of this pattern.
Crystal companion
In Crystal Cassandra's work, certain stones are the somatic companion to certain practices. The pairing is not magical; it is a steady weight in the palm that becomes part of the noticing.
Rose Quartz
Rose Quartz is the stone most associated with mettā-style practice in the modern Western crystal canon. Many practitioners simply hold it through the difficult-person phase, which gives the hand somewhere to be and keeps the practice a felt thing rather than an argument you are conducting with yourself about someone.
Adjacent weathers
The weathers nearest to The Wildfire on the wheel, often what shows up as runner-up in the assessment, and what the texts agree often follows or precedes this state.
Notes from Aria Stillwater
No schedule and no newsletter. Aria writes occasionally on practice, on attention, and on the days it is hardest to begin. One reply removes you.
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