Tara Brach - 2008-07-09 - Three Attitudes that Awaken and Free Our Spirit

Episode Date: March 10, 2010

2008-07-09 Our predicament is intuiting our true nature--love, awareness--and yet regularly contracting into the self-identity conditioned by wants and fears. This talk explores three essential and liberating ways of relating to our human conditioning: forgiving that it arises, interest in what is true, and regarding experience with friendliness and kindness.

Sometimes when I come in, somebody just hands me something, and I want to read you what was handed to me today. This is a horoscope. This is if you happen to be a Scorpio. Here you go. True inner peace alludes you this week when you eat seven guacamole tacos with extra hot sauce. So it fits the topic of the evening, which is how to make the best guacamole when avocados are in season. there is a phrase that I find really useful and it's called the big squeeze and I first heard it Pema Chodron coined it many years ago and the big squeeze is basically our predicament

that every day we sense how we're just reactive we're caught in the conditioning to feel like a kind of small, busy self on his or her way somewhere and stressed, and we're kind of small. And we also deeply intuit this kind of mystery, love, consciousness that really is our source. I mean, we would not be here. If there wasn't something we sensed about what we are and about what's living through each of these beings that we want to more awaken to. So the big squeeze is the fact that as much as that's our intention to be awake and conscious and come home to this truth,

this conditioning is really strong and it grabs us. And we're imprisoned often in our reactions, in our fears, and in our anger and our blaming and our judgments. And so we become this self that's rather contracted. Angelus Celestius writes, God, whose love and joy are present everywhere, can't come to visit you unless you aren't there. God whose love and joy are present everywhere

can't come to visit you unless you aren't there. So we can substitute, if God were, for you, that's fine, or we could say awareness or spirit or divinity, but that which is sacred can't visit, we can't experience that fullness unless in some way we're not there. And let's see what we mean by that. And it's because this is very integral to the non-dual wisdom traditions, including Buddhism, the sense that, and we intuit it also, that we have to get out of the way sometimes, that there's some big, clunky, self-obsessive, self-preoccupation that's just getting in the way, getting in the way from really letting ourselves love fully.

It's like we're so occupied, this sense of the self that's here. And the response to the big squeeze is a gradual waking up from being so identified with that sense of self. It doesn't mean that we're trying to get rid of the wants or the fears. It doesn't mean we're trying to get rid of grief or thoughts. What it means to say when we're not getting in the way is that our whole sense of being isn't fixated on that sense of self. One way to consider, to consider, literate, is this freedom that the Buddha talks about, is the freedom to live in this world, to feel these forms and the breeze and hear the birds and live this life fully, and yet continue to remember the awareness and the consciousness that's our source.

The suffering is when our sense of identity gets hitched to something smaller. than that consciousness. And some of you might remember, I've described this here and also in some workshops. One of my favorite stories has to do with the ancient capital of Sukhitae in Thailand,

where there's in the main hall of one of the temples, a huge, huge statue of the Buddha. It's been there for centuries and centuries, clay, plaster kind of covering, not particularly beautiful, but people loved it for its staying power and pilgrims would come to see it from all over. But, you know, because it had survived.

Storms and invading armies and changes of government. But a few years ago, now it's probably about six or eight years ago, there was a really long, extended dry season and these cracks appeared in this statue. And so one enterprising monk took this little pen flashlight and peered in to see what the infrastructure of this huge statue was. And what shown out was the brilliance of gold. And so he went to another crack and put his little flashlight in and again, vosh, gold. And it turned out, because they of course took off all the clay and plaster, is it was the largest gold statue of the Buddha in Southeast Asia. And the monks believe this work of art had been covered with clay and plaster because they wanted to protect it from harm

during periods of strife and violence and so on, much in the same way that we cover our own innate purity with our defenses and our obsessing and our kind of preoccupation. We cover ourselves to protect ourselves, to get through the day. And the suffering is that we take ourselves to be the plaster of clay covering, our persona. in others we get identified with our obsessing and our addicting and the wanting self and the fearing self

and we forget who we are that's the suffering and the whole of the spiritual path is this waking up from this small self story that's hitched its identity to the clay and the plaster to the covering to the offenses. What happens is we get very familiar with certain patterns in us. So if we have a sense of something's missing and we're always kind of chasing after, that becomes the familiar sense of self. Or if we always feel judged and criticized and that something's wrong, then our sense of self organizes around that. Or if we always feel, let's say we got the message early on, you're not enough and we in some way always feel inadequate that feels like self and then our life we act out of that where there's a kind of a trance because we don't see the bigger picture because we're living in that

story a young man once asked god how long a million years was to him god replied a million years to me is just like a single second in your time then the young man asked god what a million dollars was to him. God replied, a million dollars to me is just like a single penny to you. Then the young man got up his courage and asked God, could I have one of your pennies? God smiled and said, certainly, just a second. When we're in this, what I call a trance, it's a selfing trance, when we're occupied with our idea of I need more of this and less of that, love is obscured. When we're trying to get more of something, and when we're trying to protect against something,

we can have the abstract sense of loving, but it's not visceral. And the more stressed we are, the more there's a sense of something's wrong or something's missing, and our entire world gets filtered through that. So what happens is that everyone we see becomes a person that's either another threat

that might judge us or take something from us, or another object of maybe this person can approve me and give something to me, or else if they don't fit in with our agenda, we don't really see them at all. Somebody told this to me last year of an older woman in Miami sitting on a park bench, very disheveled man and tattered clothing sits down next to her. So she asks them, so, how are you? And he goes, well, I'm actually, I'm just out of prison, 25 years. she goes oh what were you in for and he said murdering my wife she goes oh so you're single

that's really bad i know there's a basic teaching when we talk about the big squeeze when we talk about how hooked we are into this conditioning and the basic teaching is this that we can't stop what arises in other words the greed or the grasping or the fear or the jealousy are the feelings of inadequacy. We can't control the waves. They happen. What matters on the spiritual path is the attitude or way we relate

to the weather systems. They're going to play out. We're in a form. We're born on this earth. We're born into a culture that is absolutely hell-bent on consuming and destroying the earth and attacking other countries.

We're born in, into families where out of our own parents' fear and preoccupation, there wasn't the kind of deep attention and seeing who we were and loving us for that. It's all a matter of degree. But we're programmed, we're conditioned. The weather systems are going to play out of self-aversion or grasping or fear. We can't stop that, but what can absolutely radically liberate us is how we pay attention, the attitude. And that's what I'd like to talk about tonight is the three key attitudes or qualities that ways we can pay attention to this conditioning, to the big squeeze in a way that frees us. And the first one is to forgive the fact that the

conditioning is happening. And it can get very subtle, but when we're feeling selfish or preoccupied or judgmental or angry or jealous it's very hard to accept that that's what's happening it has big implications about our sense of okay selfhood you know so the very first one is to as it said not take it so personally it's not our fault and i read you one of my favorite stories The messages are urgent, but they may arrive for all we know in a fragrance of ambiguity. At home, 4 p.m. today, says the female moth, and releases a brief explosion of bombacol, a single molecule of which will tremble the hairs of any male within miles and send him driving upwind in a confusion of ardor.

But it is doubtful if he has an awareness of being caught in an aerosol, chemical attractant. On the contrary, he probably finds suddenly that it has become an excellent day, the weather remarkably bracing and the time appropriate for a bit of exercise of the old wings, a brisk turn upwind. On route, traveling the gradient of bombocall, he notes the presence of other males heading in the same direction, all in a good mood inclined to race for the sheer sport of it. Then, when he reaches his destination, it may seem the the most extraordinary of coincidences, the greatest piece of luck. Bless my soul, what have we here? You get it? We take it so personally, whether it's our passion or our fear. We say,

oh, it's self and I caused it and I should be able to control it. It's chemical. It's cultural. It's conditioning. We have three brains. We use 100% of the two lower brains, the reptilian and the limbic, 20% of the neo-mammalian, and we use that mostly to explain away acts based on the lower two. It's called the rationalizing mind. But think of it.

I mean, huge amounts of our life perceptions and experience, it's just our hereditary experience as a human animal. And like a one-celled creature with a membrane, we extend to get food, and we contract against danger. And I remember going to one conference that was describing how conditioned we are and they had a big poster

and it described the four Fs, feeding, fighting, fleeing, and reproduction. So every one of us, you know, we're designed to perceive separation. Every one of us, we're designed this way. I mean, we're here and we're told spiritually it's all one. Our entire nervous system and brain is rigged to look at the world in a dualistic way.

We're designed that way. That's not the end of the evolutionary story. We're also designed to be able to deepen our attention and wake up from that dualistic filter. But it's really important first to recognize it's part of our developmental design to get stuck as a small self with all the pettiness or what,

it seems like neurotic expressions of that. Our brain is hardwired. I found this interesting. We're hardwired to generate an ongoing small signal of fear to keep us wary and vigilant to detect threats, so much so that we naturally wake up 10 times a night to check our environment for threats. But unless we have insomnia, we fall asleep and don't remember it.

and then we feel bad about ourselves for being an anxious person. Do you know what I mean? I mean, we take it personally like there's something wrong with me. Anxiety makes it very difficult to turn the attention in a consistent way to our inner experience as we're asked to in meditation. Because again, this wiring makes us want to keep checking the environment to see if anything's wrong. and then we feel like, oh, I'm a bad meditator.

I keep leaving presence. So I'm taking some time with this because in the Buddhist scriptures it's called the second arrow. And the first arrow, this big squeeze, is all this conditioning that's playing out. The second arrow, which we all shoot into ourselves, is the judgment that something's bad

or wrong with me for having this happen. I shouldn't feel deficient, I shouldn't feel anxious, I shouldn't even be grieving this long. So we add a judgment on and what does that do? It deepens the selfing trance. Not only are we having a hard time, we're bad for having a hard time. We go through the day comparing ourselves to we have an idea of how we should be. Now most of us carry that around with us. Sometimes it's real distinctive and sometimes it's vague,

but we have an idea of how we should be feeling and acting and looking and so on. And we compare ourselves to others. Dan Goldman in his writings on social intelligence says that when we're not facing a life-death issue, the default position of the mind is to compare to others to see where we are in the pecking water. We're hurt animals. and we can never be as good as everybody

so to be human is to feel inferior you know it's like we keep on making these comparisons and we do a lot of acting good we act in order to have others approve of us so there's a lack of spontaneity because we're constantly computing how we look to others and if we're meeting the criteria

and then if it's not others we've internalized the standards some of you might remember this children were lined up in a cafeteria of a Catholic elementary school for lunch. At the head of the table was a large pile of apples. The nun made a note and posted it on the apple tray. Take only one. God is watching. Moving further along the lunch line at the other end of the table was a large pile of chocolate chip cookies. A child had written a note. Take all you want. God is watching the apples.

So this first attitude that I'm taking some time with is that it's a given that we have this conditioning and that as we start wising up on the spiritual path, the first attitude is one of really being good-natured about the conditioning, forgiving towards the conditioning, good-humored about the conditioning. We're all in it together. Robert Thurman, father of Uma, he says that meditation is an evolutionary sport, you know, that we're recognizing the conditioning and beginning to not add that second arrow. I like to quote Carl Rogers because I feel like it's so valuable.

He said the great or the curious paradox was, it wasn't until I accepted myself just as I was that I was free to change, that this forgiving attitude towards the conditioning is actually the precursor or the preconditioned to authentic transformation. And it doesn't mean that we can't bad mouth and judge ourselves into changing some, but not in terms of a meaningful deep transformation where we're awakening our hearts. That never comes out of judging ourselves, out of making ourselves wrong. Okay, so attitude one. How long did I spend on that one? It's so important. If all we walk away with is a little more of that intention when we feel caught in bad personhood to go, okay, conditioning. It's just those two brains taking over and all that.

It'll loosen things up tremendously. The second attitude that I'd like to mention is is a kind of curiosity or interest in truth so that when the conditioning is playing out there's something in us that is more interested in what's real, what's true and what's happening than escaping, leaving, excusing, judging, doing anything. In other words, there's an interest in being here and discovering what's happening.

And I think that the inquiry with this second attitude really is what is happening inside me right now. And the tool that's very useful is a noting. And it could be just simply just noting fear and just going fear, fear. This is one of the tools of Vopassana, of mindfulness practice. There's a teaching that when a shaman names a fear, it loses its power. And this is the basic mechanism of what's liberating about mindfulness

is that in the moments that you can notice what's happening, okay, tightness, fear, anger, hurt, if you can notice it in the noticing, the identification with what's happening loosens. How come? the very act of noticing means that you're not that which you're noticing.

You have enlarged to a larger space of awareness and your meta to the experience. So one of the tools with the conditioning and the big squeeze is to have that interest in what's happening and just notice it. Just notice with clarity. Oh, right now, feeling self-conscious,

anxious. restless. And it's, it can be a light noticing where you go fear, fear, and there's not too much disidentification, because it's almost like you're using the noting to push away the fear, in which case you're more identified, or it can be a very deep recognition where there's a really profound kind of presence, in which case the whole sense of a fearful self starts dissolving. So that's the second attitude is this kind of interest, more interested in what's real than thinking about the future, reprocessing the past? It's that Zen inquiry. What is this? What's really happening? Now, there's no way to have that interest and not feel from inside your body what's happening.

In other words, if you ask the question and it's mental, it will in no way help to free up the identification. It has to be an embodied inquiry. We'll have a chance to practice together a little. I want to get named the third attitude. So there's forgiving the conditioning. There's a curiosity, okay, so what is this? And the third is an attitude of authentic friendliness.

where there's a real, a gentle allowing that's friendly of what's there. And I sometimes consider this an intimate attention. If you could say that the third attitude is this willingness to be intimate. There's a Zen teaching that to be truly liberated is to be intimate with all things. So it's an unconditional intimacy with what's going on. Now, it takes practice because the very nature of the selfing trance is to do the opposite of the three attitudes. When we're in the selfing trance, we've nailed ourselves with a second arrow, we've told herself this is really bad and it's bad that I'm experiencing this.

We're not interested in what's going on. We're interested in getting away from what's going on. And there's no quality of friendliness at all. So what happens is that, that when we begin to cultivate these three attitudes, we actually wake up out of our old familiar small sense of self. Does that make sense? We're directly deconditioning the trance of self with these three attitudes. Tell you a story. Tell you a story that exemplifies this.

This was last year, a man that met with me was, he came to talk about anger because his wife had left him and he couldn't forgive her for that. He felt that she had ruined his life. And it always carried over. He'd be with their children and as much as he knew all about triangulation and not bad-mouthing his ex,

it just came out. It was just in the field and he couldn't restrain from it. And so then he was down, the next arrow was he was, of course, very, very blaming of himself. for falling into that. So the first thing we did was kind of as if you're putting a frame around a picture.

We said, okay, so the situation is that this really huge painful thing happened in your life and there's a reaction going on. And are you willing for right now rather than making yourself wrong to just let this be for a moment so that you can begin to really find out what's happening. So it was kind of like he made an agreement to put aside this huge tendency to huge self-aversion. And as he began to then just directly investigate that question, that interest, like what's really happening?

Underneath the anger, as you might imagine, was real hurt and real grief. And underneath even the hurt and the grief, there's a sense of I'm fundamentally broken and will never find love. So there's a kind of despair in there, really, really deep kind of despair, not lovable. And the way that the story played out is that really my children will find out what a unlovable being I am and they won't love me. And that was the rock bottomist in some way that's where it constellated is, my children won't love me. And when he could get really honest, because he got really, okay.

Okay, so it's about I don't feel like I'm lovable, that belief and the feeling of that, as he felt it directly, not making himself wrong, not making her wrong, there was a genuine tenderness, like a sense of sorrow for that pain in himself. The more he could name it, just that sense of grieving, fearing I'm unlovable,

the more he could name it, the more he felt that sense of a kind of kindness. I told him a bit of, you know, how I sometimes work with the big squeeze when I'm really caught in this intense condition. And that is that I will, I live near the river and I'll go to the river and I'll sense the current of the river and I'll feel like I'll feel the pain in my heart, the twist, the fear, the hurt. And I'll feel that the currents of the river just running through me. So it's almost like I'm letting life, awareness wash through me so that I can just allow there to be some movement. So I can let myself be touched by the larger world, the elements. And it's like

almost taking what's painful and surrendering it into the river of life, into something larger. So this is what he started doing. He only went to the river a few times, but he started to imagine in this river, and that when he was feeling that unlovable feeling, which he described as this aching, gaping, hole in his heart, he started feeling it and letting the currents of this kind of the currents of life and awareness like a river just wash through and washed through. And the more he let it wash through, the more he felt like he was just surrendering this grief into a larger and kinder universe. What he described was it emptied him out. And what he meant by that was that the fear and pain and hurt was still, he could sense the kind of tendrils of it, but he wasn't

collect, there wasn't a self-collected around it. It's like the river had washed through him and left some space. God, whose love and joy are present everywhere, can't. can't come to visit us unless we aren't there. So there have been this kind of washing through. So let me just say what had he actually done? What really was the process of transforming? And the first was he forgave the situation. He just said, okay, this is how it is.

I sometimes use the phrase that Ajun Cimedo offers, he's an American monk in Great Britain. It's like this. Not blaming, just forgiving. Okay, it's like this. So that was the picture frame. He let it be there. And then really inquiring, investigating,

so what's happening and touching that really deep grief? And then as he became really present with it, just sensing awareness, washing through both touching and releasing. So there was no resistance at all. forgiving, seeing what's true, and then that quality of heart that washes through and touches with friendliness and kindness whatever is here. I sometimes think about the big squeeze as a kind of way that we keep on imprisoning ourselves, that we sense the conditioning, the fear, the hurt,

and that we keep, that instead of presence, we rejects. ourselves and in doing so we lock ourselves in. And I came upon a poem by Javis that I wanted to read you because I felt like it spoke to this. We have not come here to take prisoners, but to surrender ever more deeply to freedom and joy. We have not come into this exquisite world to hold ourselves hostage from love. Run, my dear, from anything that may not

strengthen your precious budding wings. Run, my dear, from anything that may not strengthen your precious

budding wings. Run like hell, my dear, from anyone likely to put a sharp knife into the sacred,

tender vision of your beautiful heart. We have a duty to befriend those aspects of being that's

stand outside our house and shout to our reason, oh please, oh please, come out and play. We have not come here to take prisoners or to confine our wondrous spirits. For we have not come here to take prisoners or to confine our wondrous spirits, but to experience ever and ever more deeply our divine courage, freedom, and light. so run my dear to Noah is saying let go let go of any judgments that keep you small any judgments you have of yourself that keep you small

let it go let it go for we have not come here to take prisoners or to confine our wonder spirits it's possible it's possible and it doesn't have to be slower gradual it's possible to truly let go of the judgments that keep us small of ourselves. It takes a commitment,

in a way it takes a real sincere commitment that we want to be free more than we want to buy into the stories that we keep telling ourselves about what's wrong with us. It takes a certain vigilance in the sense of alertness to notice, oh, again,

this is just a story about a small self. don't have to believe the story. And what happens, what happens when we adopt these three attitudes of not believing the story that something's wrong, of just being courageously interested in what's real,

and of being kind, is that the selfing trance begins to dissolve. And not only do we sense our own radiance, not only do we sense that the one right now who's looking out, through your eyes is the one. The God you're looking for is looking out through your eyes.

The truth you're seeking is that awareness that's listening. It's the presence that's here. So that as this big squeeze begins to dissolve, there's a trusting that. It's like it becomes more familiar to be resting in presence and know that as who you are than any of the old stories of a superior or inferior self. And that's the grace of this path. That that's what becomes familiar. And then our actions come from that, come from knowing that radiance as our home. our actions and what's to me quite beautiful is that the more we trust who we are the more we've become almost reflexively forgiving

of the conditioning and kind the more that's our natural response to those that we meet another story this author says a few years ago I was with a close woman friend in a grocery store in California as we snaked along the aisles we became aware of a mother with a small boy moving in the opposite direction

and meeting us head on in each aisle. The woman barely noticed us because she was so furious at her little boy who seemed intent on pulling items off the lower shelves. As the mother became more and more frustrated, she started to yell at the child and several aisles later had progressed to shaking him by the arm. At this point, my friend spoke up.

A wonderful mother of a wonderful mother of three and founder of a progressive school, she had probably never once in her life treated any child so harshly. I expected my friend would give this woman a solid mother-to-mother talk about controlling yourself and about the effect this behavior has on a child. Braced for a confrontation, I felt a spike in my already elevated adrenaline. Instead, my friend said, What a beautiful little boy. How old is he? The woman answered cautiously. he's three. My friend went on to comment about how curious he seemed and how her own three children were just like him in the grocery store, pulling things off shelf, so interested in all the wonderful colors and packages. He seemed so bright and intelligent, my friend said. The woman had the boy in her arms now by now and a shy smile came up on her face, gently brushing his hair out of his eyes. She goes, yes, he's very smart and curious, but sometimes he wears me out. my friend responded sympathetically yes they can do that they're so full of energy as we walked away i heard

the mother speaking more kindly to the boy about getting home and cooking his dinner we'll have your favorite macaroni and cheese she told him so this is a bit of the gift we bring when we wake up from that trance that has us so preoccupied with me so down on me so anxious about what I'm going to get done today, we can have the space to look at who's here and be much more forgiving of that person's conditioning and much more clear seeing of what's going on and much more kind. So even though the past, sometimes the practices look like we're trying to free a self, it's really we're waking up out of a small story so that we can really awaken together, so that we can together realize this sacred

presence that's living through each of us. It's a deep training. I sometimes think of it as a surrendering presence. Because the big squeeze is that we keep re-hooking onto things, we keep getting re-hooked to ideas and thoughts and behaviors and emotions. We're constantly noticing or hooked and letting go of the grip. And the reason I love so much the image and sense of the currents of a river is because this impermanent changing world is flowing through us every moment and we can't stop anything or control anything but we can notice what's happening and let go into the flow. We can go with it. We can relax with it. And in relaxing with this ever-changing life,

we discover that which is timeless and changeless and eternal. This radiance of presence, it's right here. It's not an abstraction. It's a really powerful practice just to ask, can I sense my own presence in this moment? And if the inquiry is something where you start grasping or trying to see something, all you'll do is come up with another small self.

But if instead you just be quiet, that's the real meaning of pausing. You know, just stop, stop and let go into what's right here. The luminous and open wakefulness is right here. So again tonight, we're really kind of describing the three attitudes that help dissolve the small-mindedness and allow us to come home to that luminosity. To forgive the conditioning,

to have that interest, what is this? And then to regard it with a gentleness, a kindness, and allowing. So let's practice a little. It'll be very short closing meditation. Let yourself arrive right here. Just start fresh in this moment. Let your senses be awake. you might feel your breath with a gentle attention

see if there's a way to relax a little more right now and you might in a natural way reflect on today yesterday your current life and sense if there's anywhere that you feel kind of caught in that squeeze where it's either anxiety or depression anger or something where you're getting hitched, caught stuff And if there's nothing going on right now, feel free during this final meditation to really

let your practice be simple presence. But if there's a place that could be loosened up, where there can be some freeing up, just notice, is there something going on where you're at war with yourself or another person, where you feel confined, where you've taken yourself prisoner in some way, as a beast puts it. And if there's a war, you're not going to be able to is, you might notice what the predominant emotional flavor is if it's anger or anxiety, fear, depression. And just sense it as a weather system, whatever the conditioning that you're feeling caught in is. Just let your intention be right now not to add the second arrow. The sense that like yourself, there's hundreds of other people in this room also sensing

places of stuckness. Just weather patterns of thoughts and feelings. So that the attitude is one of really forgiving or allowing this is what's just like this right now. And just begin to investigate with interest, what's true, what's really the most difficult thing about the situation? What's the feeling, the felt sense? It's the most difficult to be with.

Maybe it's a feeling of personal failure, of rejection, anticipating something that's going to go wrong, fear. Keep your inquiry in your body, just feel what's going on in your body about the situation. So the attention becomes intimate. And if you can feel in the throat or chest or belly, some agitation or tightness, bring a friendly attention, breathing with it. So this is the third attitude that whatever you're feeling, now, maybe you're numb and disconnected. Still, friendliness. For some, it helps to put the hand

on the chest and just offer friendliness with a very light touch to your own being, to your own heart. Very powerful way to have this third attitude of kindness. For some, you might imagine a river or a current that are just washing through. A mirror of kindness that's flowing through the hurting place, washing it, releasing it, surrendering. So there's an authentic presence with whatever's going on, an honest attention, a kind attention, for we've not come here to take prisoners or to confine our wondrous spirits, but to experience ever and ever more deeply our divine courage, freedom, and light. In these final moments,

you might sense the attitude that as you move into the future you'd like to hold this experience in. So when it comes up again, whatever it is, that there's more consciousness about forgiving, about truthful presence,

kindness, into it that when this attitude, these three attitudes are there, the quality of presence, how you experience your own being, how much larger and freer that can be. May all beings everywhere be filled with loving presence, be held in loving presence. May all beings everywhere touch a great and natural peace. May there be peace on earth. May there be peace on earth. May there be peace on earth and peace everywhere. May all beings awaken and be free.

Namaste. The teaching you have received has been freely offered. If you would like to contact the Insight Meditation Community of Washington to make a donation or to learn more about our programs, please visit our website at www.comcw.org. me.