Tara Brach - 2014-08-27 - Meditation - Space and Aliveness

Episode Date: August 30, 2014

2014-08-27 - Guided Meditation - Space and Aliveness

The following meditation is led by Tara Brock, meditation teacher, psychologist, and author. And when you closed your eyes, take some moments to sense your posture, because this posture, this body is what allows us to really touch into certain qualities of heart-mind. See if you're sitting tall, so there's that aspect of being alert, but not stiff. See if you can relax some in that tallness, chest open, belly soft. Take a few full breaths. And as you settle, you might let your attention come to the area of the heart. And just inquire in a simple way what really brings me here tonight?

What is my intention for tonight? What is my deepest intention? Take some time just to listen, sense what bubbles up, sense what brings a feeling of sincerity as you land on it. And still feeling the heart, the heart area. You might gently bring the palms together. So you're drawing, centering the whole attention at the heart as we chant the simple mantra, om, this sound current of connectedness. And we'll chant it three times.

is letting go into the sound current with your heart, inhaling deeply to begin. Most direct portal, perhaps to presence is through this living body, relaxing and waking up. You might begin by softening the eyes. If you can even imagine smiling into the eyes, so there's a sense of the corners of the eyes lifted up a bit. The brow smooth. The same slight smile at the mouth. See if you can relax. the jaw and let the tip of the tongue press lightly at the roof of the mouth right behind

the teeth and then relax the root of the tongue, feeling the sensations through the whole mouth, lips, jaw relax, letting the shoulders be relaxed, let them drop back and down a bit and place the awareness inside the shoulders and see if you can sense kind of dissolving. It helps to maybe imagine ice to water. See if you can feel that from the inside out. And notice the experience of water to gas, to vapor. Can you sense the space that's interior to sensation, the sensation arises out of space and aliveness? See if you can feel the energy through the arms in the same way, the region of the arms filled with space and aliveness. Let the hand hands rest in a very easy and effortless way.

And then softening the hands, softening, softening, softening. What happens as you feel the hands from the inside out? What do you notice? Can you feel the movement of energy, tingling, vibrating? You feel the space and aliveness inside the hands. Let there be an openness to the chest. And feeling the whole heart area from the inside out.

inside out. What's the experience of sensation in the heart area right now? Can you sense the space and aliveness there? Laxing the belly. Letting this next in breath be received in a softening belly. This breath and then this one. And again, you can feel sensation and aliveness deep in the torso. Let the eyes still be soft, the mouth and a slight smile, root of the tongue relaxed, hands soft, chest open, belly soft, feeling the movement of the breath deep in the torso, opening deep into the pelvic area, hips, buttocks, genitals, for that whole region be filled with space and aliveness. Notice if you can feel the interior of the legs, muscle, flesh bone, upper legs and lower legs, right down into the feet, feeling the feet from

the inside out. What do you notice about the sensations there? Feeling the feet, letting the hands be soft and widening the lens to sense this whole body as a field of sensation, as space and aliveness, not stopping anything, not resisting. just relaxing back, becoming that alert space, sensing the whole play of aliveness of sensation, sensing that openness and that open field, the play of sound, letting the sounds wash through you. Notice what the sense of your presence is right now,

quality of awakeness and openness. And just be that. rest in that. Become aware that the mind's drifted as it quite naturally will. Become aware of thoughts, a commentary, the past, the future. Then gently pause and arrive again, feeling the aliveness and space sits here, wherever the sounds. And for some of it's helpful letting the in flow, outflow of the breath be in the foreground, to steady the mind, to stabilize your presence. A relaxed attentiveness and interest to this moment-to-moment flow of experience, as right now. And if the mind's been wandering to just appreciate this process of waking up, the fruit

of meditation comes from this attitude of appreciating waking up, not judging, falling asleep. Just to let this be fresh right now, starting fresh. You can re-relax the body a little. Just give yourself that gift of letting go a little in the shoulders, softening the hand, softening the belly, relaxing your heart. Just feel yourself here again. the sounds and the sensations. And in the background, that alert inner stillness, your own presence,

as presence. Attentiveness, close in a very simple way tonight, just to offer some blessing, some message of care to your own being. From this awakening heart space to offer your blessing to all beings.