Tara Brach - 2014-12-10 - Meditation: Intimacy with the Flow of Life

Episode Date: December 13, 2014

2014-12-10 - Meditation: Intimacy with the Flow of Life

The following meditation is led by Tara Brock, meditation teacher, psychologist, and author. Just let your senses be awake. You might feel the movement of the breath. And feel the breath in the heart area so that you begin to let the attention collect in the heart area. It's feeling the experience of your heart right now. And with that, let there be an inquiry. What is my intention? for tonight. What is it that really brings me here tonight? In that inquiry, just a sense

to what feels most sincere in you, what really matters. It's from that place of heart and of caring, whether it's caring about presence or about touching peace, being more real, being more open-hearted, whatever it is that brings you. Just to feel your sense. sincerity and we'll chant together the mantra ome, which is sound current of connectedness. And if you'd like to bring the palms together, touching lightly at the heart, as a way of deepening that heart presence, please do so. So we'll chant three times and begin by taking a nice full in breath and continuing in mindfulness. Let your senses be awake, aware of listening, seeing sense of sounds, soft sounds in the room, and the space in the room

with that same receptivity, widening and hearing perhaps the more distant sounds, noticing that with listening there's nothing to do. Sounds are known spontaneously by awareness. Bringing that kind of receptive open presence to feeling the life of the body. You might feel the area around the eyes and the brow and just soften a little. Let the brow be smooth. Then receptive to the sensations that are there. You'll find the more that you relax and soften, the more you can experience.

Let the jaw be unhinged, relaxing the mouth, relaxing right to the root of the tongue. It's feeling the sensations. the aliveness in the tongue, the gums, teeth, lips. You might imagine the throat filling, the neck area, and just opening to the aliveness and sensation there, bringing the awareness inside the shoulders. Just notice the experience of sensations in the shoulders. There may be a frozenness or a tightness.

tension, movement. Just let what's there unfold itself in awareness. Float in awareness. Let your hands rest in an easy and effortless way. And softening the hands, placing the awareness inside the hands. And again, receptive experience of sensation there. what's it like

from the inside out feeling the hands right now let there be an openness to the chest and feeling the heart from the inside out as if you could place your entire awareness in the heart area and again letting the aliveness

that's there float unfold sometimes untangle in awareness scanning down the body feeling the area of the belly, or what's called the dantiana, a little below the belly. Just softening and loosening. See if you can let this next breath be received in a softening belly. This breath, and now this one, and again, letting the awareness fill the whole

stomach and abdominal area. Feeling from the inside out the play of aliveness. Soft, belly, soft hands, soft eyes, growing presence in the body. Relaxing down through the whole pelvic area, letting awareness fill that region, open and receptive to the dance of aliveness, letting awareness scan down through the legs, feeling the feet from the inside out. Again, that play of tingling and vibrating and aliveness that's the You might sense the earth, the vastness of aliveness, beneath and around you, just naturally pouring through and moving through and flowing through your body. So you can feel your whole body is a field of sensation, fully opening to the aliveness,

not resisting or opposing anything. So you're really letting life live through you, aware of the play of sensation, aware of the symphony of sound. So you're listening to and feeling the whole moment, continuing to be aware in the foreground of this play of aliveness, sounds, sensations. In the background of the presence that's receiving, perceiving, witnessing, all that's happening, this alert, inner stillness,

That's the most subjective truth of what we are. At some point you'll notice that the minds drifted into a virtual reality, into a kind of trance of thinking. And you might consider that an opportunity to practice homecoming to get the knack of coming back, being here again. When you realize you've been often thought, just simply pause. And without any judgment, just appreciate noticing again, oh, right here, right here.

Where are the sounds that are actually happening moment to moment, where of the sensations or feelings or emotions that are here. You're relaxing back, opening this moment-to-moment flow of experience. And again, you can sense in the background that silence that's listening, the stillness out of which all this aliveness is pouring forth again and again relaxing back into presence and letting this life live through you. Last few moments to explore for yourself what it means to be intimate with the life that's right here. Connected to, tender with, awake to,

open to this moment to moment flow.