Tara Brach - Freedom in the Midst of Difficulty

Episode Date: March 7, 2012

2012-03-07 - Freedom in the Midst of Difficulty - We suffer when we forget who we are and get caught in a limited sense of self. This talk explores how we become identified with a sliver of what we are, and the pathway to remembering our wholeness. When we know we're the ocean, we are free to relate to the waves with respect, compassion and love. Please support this podcast by donating at www.tarabrach.com or www.imcw.org. Your donation makes a difference! Thank you!

I'd like to begin by telling you about a friend of mine who, some years back, went to Asia and practiced for three months in a monastery. And towards the end of his time, he was increasingly having a kind of sense of real stillness and open-heartedness. It was a kind of openness where there wasn't any grasping, any want for anything to be different. There wasn't a sense of somebody there. whether it was owning the experience or controlling anything. So there's a real sense of freedom and well-being. And he asked himself, as we well might, well, is this enlightenment? You know, it was really his question.

And then he went, came back to the States and spent the holidays with his wife's family and came to the conclusion it wasn't. But in a way it was and it wasn't. And I like the way I like to frame it, and many teachers put it this way, is we can have enlightened moments. And for him, they were, what you might say, unstable,

that what allowed that experience to really be in its fullness was a very structured environment and an intensive practice. But, you know, I've heard from many of you, many people tell me at the end of some of our retreats and even after a class that there was this time of kind of settledness and our quietness

or touching some peace or a feeling of this heart that was not holding back love. And then also I hear people say and then I started talking to people or I went home and had a conversation with my husband about who was going to drive so-and-so to the school next day and it all just vanished. So that's what happens, that we touch.

And when I consider really valuable, we have a taste sometimes the freedom of that where we're not so self-centered and there's an openness and a presence. And then because we still have a lot of habits of reacting, we clutch. We move from that non-self-centeredness and that openness. into a very solid kind of sense of here I am and I'm having a hard time and this is what I need to do and our narratives back in action, right? So the defining feature of any moment where there's really no suffering, any moment where there's really happiness, and I don't mean the kind of happiness because we just won, you know, a big award, but a kind of happiness that's really deep. The defining feature

is that there's not a sense of a self-identity. There's not a kind of centralizing of experience. Now, we might not consciously be aware that that's what's happening. We might not be saying to ourselves, oh, a selfless moment, you know. But in the moments where we're not holding on and we're not resisting when we're just meeting life with our whole body, our whole awareness, There's not a solidification of self. And so this is the way the Tibetan book of the dead puts it.

It says, oh, nobly born, oh, you of glorious origins, remember your radiant true nature, the essence of mine. Trust it. Return to it. It's home. What happens to us? We just leave home. We forget. I think of a lot of this path as forgetting.

We forget really who we are. We forget that love and that awareness and that creativity and that presence. And we go into this trance where we're in a kind of familiar but very narrowed sense of who we are. And we operate in it, but it doesn't feel good because it's not home. And that in some way motivates us to pay attention in a way. that helps us remember. And the more we have the taste of freedom, the more we get the sense of that really is who I am. There's the kind of sincerity that grows that this is really, this feels like the truth of my being. And then we get motivated to bring it into all the parts of our

life. And I really feel like the, where spirituality becomes mature is when we're not just a yogi on a cushion trying to make a spiritual experience happen. But where there's this unfolding where through all the domains of our life, there's more and more of a sense of living from who we are. There's more of that congruence, that remembering. So what I would like to talk about tonight and maybe next week, I'm not sure, I haven't kind of figured out how much I want to cover, is the centrality of this sense of identity. You know, to get us more awake to, oh, okay, consolidated, strong self here, have kind of forgotten the bigger picture.

So we're more awake to when we forget, we kind of notice the forgetting, which of course is the beginning of coming back home again. So we begin with the word identification. And it's broken down, idem means same. Idem means same. And Fassiri means to make. So when we identify with something, we make it the same as self.

There's this kind of ego, self-identity. And what's happening is there's all these different facets of our experience that we say, oh, this is me. We kind of pull together a constellation, and that's our familiar sense of self. So what's it made of? What do we identify?

with. Well, we identify with our bodies and our appearances, right? That's a big one. We identify with the strong, most predominant emotions that we feel and the thoughts and beliefs that typically go with them. That feels like me. When stuff happens, it's happening to me or I'm causing it. So the body, the emotions, the thoughts. And of course, we identify with our roles. We hold them tight, that is me. We identify sometimes with our religion, with our politics. Very strong.

It's a very, you know, where we have a lot, very strong feelings, strong identity. When we have strong aversion, strong identification. When we have strong attachment, that's me. The identity is solid.

So we start looking and sense, you know, what are we identifying? the most with and where is it causing pain in our life. And sometimes it's not. You know, we hold together this constellation with this narrative. We're always talking to ourselves about who we are and what's happening in our life. And we kind of present the main themes to others. You know, I am this kind of person, I'm that kind of person. You know, I'm a recovering addict, or I'm a businessman, or I'm an intellectual scholarly type, or I'm a liberal or whatever it is.

You know, I was reminded the other day, my husband Jonathan, has on his resume on his website, and anywhere he has promotional materials, he's got his name, Jonathan Faust, and then it says M.A. Well, it wasn't until a few months ago that somebody actually said to him, so what's the CSA? And with a great amount of dignity, he said, it's Cub Scouts of America. It was the first time anyone asked. Now, these are on resumes he sends to banks that he does mindfulness stuff for, and everywhere he sends it out, and it says, CSA, and, you know. So, now, is that identification a problem?

I mean, you know, I don't know how much of his sense of self is wrapped around it. But what, so what makes an identity a problem? Okay, because this is an important question. It's not a problem that an ego sense evolves. It is part of nature. It's part of the design. Ego sense emerges. It helps us to structure and organize and navigate on the planet.

But when the aspects of the constellation that were identified with are a problem is when they really define us. They prevent us from remembering what the Tibetan Book of the Dead is pointing to, this awareness, this love. of this essence quality. It's when the identification's tight

and it kind of possesses us and it squeezes us and it narrows us. Did it cause us suffering? So how it happens, how does it happen that parts of our identity really squeeze us and keep us small? I tend to think of it in terms of severed belonging. You know, the more we have a sense

of severed belonging from the whole, and for some it happens because there wasn't good enough parenting. There wasn't the kind of understanding and love that let us feel an organic sense of belonging. So something got severed. And so our identity starts clutching around things that aren't really our true nature. We develop a false cell because we don't feel that belonging. Sometimes it's severed belonging happens out of genetic causes. And largely it happens because of the dis-ease of the cultures we live in.

What are the messages we're given? Those messages help to shape our identity. And that identity is less than the truth of who we are. So if we believe it, if we're afraid we're falling short, or if we are inflated because we're so great, we're not going to see who we are. So there's a familiar domain. that we know about that happens when we feel disconnected that most of us have some of.

And it shows up when we don't feel lovable or don't feel worthy. And there's this sense of a limited self-sense. It's marked by feelings of failure often that we're just not making it or cravings that can never be really satisfied. And it's marked by difficulties with intimacy and anxiety. And that's our sense of self. It's a small sense of self. And for most of us, it also involves a sense of separate from others

and others are bad or wrong in some way or are letting us down. So this is, again, the pain of that limited self-sense. It's interesting to me, both Western and Eastern psychology are very focused on this identity we have. And in Western psychology, it's how did our object relations, our connections with others end up creating a sense of self and is it a healthy one or is it distorted, fragmented, confused? In Eastern psychology, the assumption is that

not only do we have suffering from the way the distortions of the self-senses form, but any sense of self gets in the way of us really perceiving our wholeness. So a lot of the practice of meditation is not in a real sudden way necessarily, but gradually helping us to deconstruct, to undo that sense of this is who I am, a separate self. So in our work on the spiritual path,

whether we think of it this way or not, we are in a process of gradually remembering who we are. I mean the Buddha taught that our suffering is because we forget that wholeness we forget the truth of who we are and it's almost this invitation to notice any time you're suffering who are you believing you are

what's your sense of self in those moments that's what we're going to begin to explore and do some reflections together tonight so you can begin to identify where do you get hooked Where does that sense of ego self become so solid and strong that it really causes you to forget your true belonging? Forget really where the source of happiness is. So I like to begin with the way we get identified with our body because it's, in a way the most basic. It's also quite workable.

We can begin to see it pretty clearly. And so it's very, it's kind of a sense. simple way we just get defined and for many it's by our health. We're certainly defined most of us by gender, by sexual orientation, by appearance, by our sense of age and how old am I by so what happens is let's say there's sickness. This sickness is owned by me, it's happening to me, it's caused by me, it has a very self sense to it. We identify with it. It's suppressing me. That's just an example. And then we, when we're identified with bodily things, we look at others and who do they become. What's the veil? We see another person, they're a cancer patient. All of a sudden that's

predominant. It stops us from seeing who's there. Are there obese? Are there a model? Are there an athlete? Are there an old person? Are there in some way? disabled. It stops us from seeing. I remember reading stones from the river. How many of you read that book? Stones from the river. I see. It focuses on dwarfs and the the protagonist is a dwarf. And I remember reading it and with horror realizing that all my life whenever I had thought of or seen anything to do with dwarfs, it was like I didn't not think, oh, human, subjective being this. In some way, it was like other. And it was like a real embarrassing horror when I, because you fall in love with the protagonist and her humanity, her vast

goodness. How much do we look at each other and in some way get blinded by body? And then our culture, so many standards about appearance and sexuality. and gender that really confine us that aging, that aging and sickness is like an insult. It's like this, and I can sense it for myself. I'm going to be turning 59, and in some way, I mean, there's sometimes a sense that I'm battling the insults of aging, you know, yet another is coming my way, and then this new wrinkle and this new thing. You know, it's like I'm kind of like at war in some way with this natural process, and

it's offensive. I mean, how many of you can sense that is like, it's just this message from the culture that what's desirable and good is not, you know, not old necessarily. I remember seeing a little cartoon of a couple in their mid-80s and their rockers on a porch. And she, and he's saying to her, so now you want to have an open relationship? So it's cute, but how many of us can relate? I was talking to a friend of mine who's just turning 71 and just saying the fear that's coming with aging and how many things are going

and how much in this culture women that are value, a premium is based on attractiveness and youth, big deal. And then the acute suffering of young people. As a psychologist, I worked many times with young women who are anorexic, struggling over trying to meet a standard for thinness that's actually really unhealthy. You know, how many young people struggle are males that are given this idea of what it is to be a male?

My son was recently home. He was telling me about a bachelor party. I had forgotten the rituals of a bachelor party. I'm not going to even name them all. I mean, you know, the cigar lounge and the tour of a brewery and this friends joked about that this is going to be the manliest bachelor party. you know, and like what is manly, you know?

It's confining of who we are. So I think of young boys who might not be into sports or might not be drawn to little girls, be drawn to other boys. And the tragedy of what's happened when we see the young teens that are finding out that, you know, this is a world they can't live in and committing suicide because of the anguish

of being gay. Horrible. So this identification with body is a big thing. And where you'll find it in your life is wherever there's strong reactivity, wherever you feel really attached to something bodily, you know, attached to being muscular and fit or strong or athletic or beautiful, are very aversive to something, very aversive to being sick or to aging,

or to being heavy or whatever it is. That's where the identification is. So let's reflect together. I'm going to have you reflected a few different places, but just to begin to sense for yourself. Where is this so? So in this pause, just let yourself take a few breaths and come right here.

You've been listening to a lot of words. See if you can feel your body again from the inside. And also let yourself sense how you relate to or experience your body. Perhaps its appearance, its capacities, its level of health. Notice if there's anything that

you're really, really attached to about how you want your body to be or how it is, or if there's anything you're really aversive to, what you really don't like, what you really feel should be different and you want to be different. Are you identified? Is it being a sick person or an old person or a fit person?

If you find somewhere that you can sense, there's a strong identity, a strong wanting or fearing, a sense of the kind of solid self in there that's wanting or fearing something about the body? You might ask, is this who I really am? Is this older person or heavy person? person or sick person, who I really am, just to inquire a little right now, just to ask that. Maybe you've had the experience of looking in the mirror over the years and all of a sudden

realizing you're looking at your parents' face. Like, how did that happen? But have you really changed? I mean, who's inside? Who's looking out? You know, for some, it's getting older or getting real sick, that this wisdom arises, that there's this kind of transparency all of a sudden you can sense spirit shining through, that this body is changing, coming, going. So there's not so much identification, but for most of us, before that, there's a lot of grasping, a lot of aversion. And the truth is these bodies will keep changing and eventually grow old if you don't die young and deteriorate and die. And if the self, if your self sense is identified with the body, you're going to be on a ride that's destined to be very difficult. So what helps us to loosen

that identification? To remember something more is the inquiry. Okay, so that's just touching in a little bit. This is something you can explore more deeply as you go. So that's one layer of identification. The much more difficult one is emotions, is our emotions and the beliefs that circle with them. When strong fear arises, the sense of it takes over our world. It's like, this is me. I am the fearful self. Something bad is happening to me. Or if it's craving or this is a bad self. This is a needy self. This gets very, very strong. with emotions because it occupies our whole psyche. We forget.

So there's two clumps of how we identify with emotions. Sometimes we're identifying with wanting something a whole lot. So you might sense, okay, what's this wanting self here? What are the things you want? And we sense it's when we're really wanting, let's say, a romantic relationship, or we really want someone's approval or attention, or really wanting a certain job,

to win something. I often share that line when a pickpocket sees a saint he or she sees the saint's pocket. You know, when we're really wanting, what happens to our vision, to our attention? You know, if you're traveling and you have to pee,

what are you looking at in the scenery? You know, you're looking for a rest stop, right? Unless you're a guy. They get it different ways. So our attention gets fixated We lose sight, we forget Some of you might remember this story It's one of my favorites of a man and a woman

Sitting next to each other on a plane And she's there and she sneezes And she takes out of tissue And she wipes her nose And shudders really violently for 10, 15 seconds And then he's kind of surprised Goes back to his reading But it happens again

She sneezes Takes out a tissue, gently wipes her nose But then she shudders again really violently he's getting more curious about this shuddering, what is going on with her. So it happens one more time. She sneezes, wipes her nose and shudders, and finally gets up his courage. And he says, look, you've sneezed three times and wiped your nose and shuddered. What is going on?

And she said, oh, I have a very strange condition. When I sneeze, I get an orgasm. And, you know, he's a little surprised by that. He goes, oh, what are you taking for it? And she said, pepper. So when we want something, when we're on our way to something we want, we miss out on the scenery, so to speak. And I had a really interesting discussion with my son, Narayan, who I've mentioned here in terms of his computer games in the past. And it's proportional now in his life, but he is kind of self-analyzed it because he's very into Magic the Gathering.

Some of you might be familiar with and some other games. and the way he analyzes gaming is the seasons when it's taking over his sense of self and life and he's kind of narrowed. He uses the chemical term. He's kind of on a conditioned dopamine cycle whereby every time he reaches a certain level he gets a dopamine fix her hit that really feels good. And then he wants to get the next to the next level in the game. He gets another hit.

And he's always on his way somewhere and it's kind of exciting and it's addictive. and this is interesting to me. He says, especially on some of the new video games, part of the, they have some really cool stories and really gorgeous graphics and scenery. And he says he misses out on all of it, the whole adventure and discovery and exploring and so on because he's so fixed on getting to the next level.

Well, what is happening to us when we're doing our achieving and trying to prove something? and in some way we accomplish something and check something off the list, but then we're driven to the next. I mean, how long is it when you finish a project before your mind is already looking at what next you're going to do? I mean, for me, it can be just a matter of seconds, you know?

I mean, I watch it. So we have these fixes, and within it is the sense of the doing self. There's an identity. the achieving self, the mastering, the self that's got some levels of mastery. Now, mastering itself can be a wonderful part of our unfolding. But when the drive to master becomes an addiction, the cycles that I describe, we forget who we are.

We become this achieving self that's always trying to make the next best thing happen. We can't rest. We can't remember, as the Tibetan Book of the Dead, describes that that radiance of our nature. We don't come home. So let me ask you again to reflect. This time we're going to reflect a little bit on the wanting self. Again, you're looking for where you might get hooked. The Tibetans have a word called Shenpa, which is that stickiness, where you're wanting something,

and you just keep going after it, and you can't really settle in to play. presence. For you, is it the wanting for accomplishment or achievement? Are you wanting attention? Are you wanting a partner or a different partner or something to do with a close human? Is it more to do with substances where you get caught? What is it, what's something you're really hankering after, wanting to happen, wanting to experience? As you consider this, Just imagine yourself in the thick of wanting mind when you're the wanting self, whether it's wanting another bowl of ice cream or wanting a certain job or wanting something to do with material goods or whatever it is.

You might even exaggerate right now to really tune in. What's your body like when you're wanting? You're wanting something to work out in a certain way. What's your body feel like? Can you feel the restlessness? and the tension. What's your heart feel like when you're really wanting something?

When there's kind of a grabbing or grasping or a chasing after. What's your sense of yourself when you're wanting? Do you like this self that's here when you're wanting something a lot very strongly? You're wanting somebody to be a certain way. You're wanting something to happen

or something to change. Do you like the self-sense? just to get a little familiar is again what the Buddha described, the suffering of self. It can be sometimes really strong. You might really feel shame around a needy self or an out-of-control

self, or it may be just a sense of contraction that you're not fully at home and something more whole. And either way, it's a form of suffering. It's still the pain of separation. Is this who I really am? Just ask for a moment.

Is this wanting, who I really am. Again, this is a to be continued. It's a very useful question I find to ask myself when I'm caught, is this who I really am? Just in some way jogs something. Now, then there's the averse of self. That's a self that's judging, hating, disliking, afraid, angry. That's a really strong identity. It's one that really we can feel possessed by. We might not even think of ourselves of oh, I'm the averse of self.

There's just aversion and everything is so collected around it. We're in that trance of this story of our life that's very confined and we're forgetting. We're forgetting who we are. We're forgetting who the other is. So an example

of this is a very recent story from my own life. I often don't share something this recent, but because I was working on this talk on identification, I've been really, that's been my lens as happens. And I was with a close member of my family who's dealing with impending loss and really, really struggling. And I, my intentions usually to be with somebody and, you know, kind and present. I got into this, role that sometimes happens to us where I tried to fix things and I had an idea of what should

happen. Really dangerous. I was trying to make some things right and I had a very strong opinion on it and for a spell rather than really a sensitive attending to her, you know, feelings of grief and confusion, I was being more controlling and more, you know, here's what we need to do and so on. It was really hurtful. It was very hurtful. really hurtful. I caught it. I apologized. But, you know, it wasn't quick makeup. It was hurtful. I had not been sensitive. So I, over the rest of that day, I was feeling very much really down on myself. I went into a real bad self kind of experience. And I was not thinking, oh, but the whole of me is radiant awareness. And this is just a little wave on the surface of my ocean. And, you

I was not there. You know, it was like a very strong feeling of this, you know, really yucky stabbing feeling in my heart. So it was a limited self-sense. This is my identity contracted. I was into bad personhood, and I was identifying with those waves of bad personhood, that constellation.

Now, when we're the victim, it's still a small self. I mean, she, as we could explore it together, was caught in her a victim and it still has a feeling of not okayness and we've still forgotten who we are. So let me ask you to reflect on where

aversiveness has ended up becoming a kind of centralizing place in your life where you might find that stickiness of self and identification with aversion. So again you can just close your eyes and check in

and you might just scan because again, identification happens when the feelings are very strong. What are situations where you get caught and maybe fearing what's going to happen when you're really triggered by someone, angry, betrayed? Or when there's, as I experience, a kind of shame or down on yourself, what are the situations? Or is there one that stands out for you that you can investigate right now? Now if there is one, let yourself enter it a bit. Where are you reactive?

Anger, fear, shame, and let yourself notice, you know, again, you might exaggerate a little so you can enter right in a sense the what's wrong feeling and what's really you're afraid of or upset by. Just take your time and just feel that and sense what your body's like when you're in reaction. There's judgment or real anxiety about what's going to happen. shame. What's your heart feel like? What's your sense of self when you're in this? Just look at your sense of your own identity. Like a sense of who am I? You might notice if you like this self. Maybe you do. Maybe there's a self-a righteousness or a feeling like, well, this is real and this is what

I'm feeling. But ask yourself even more deeply, is this who I really am? Can I even get a glimmer of I really am in the midst. This is really who I am. Okay, just gently come on back. This is a very quick reflection. So you didn't have a lot of time to get in touch. But for those of you that maybe got in touch with a strong current reactivity in your life, you might have noticed as I describe with myself that if you're really in it, it's a strong reaction. It does feel like me in those moments. This is, yeah, this is, this feels very solid, very like me. And to too quickly try to say, yeah, but what about that, that wholeness and that radiance, that love would actually be to dishonor the actual experience in the moment. You don't want to jump too quickly. So that inquiry of,

is this who I really am, is useful just to kind of open things up a bit, but you want to stay with the experience. And so what I'd like to do is, is for this last part of this talk is explore. How do we, with a real authenticity, move from that grip of identification to more freedom without dishonoring the realness of the feelings? Because I've seen many, many teachings or practices that says, oh, you're angry, well,

don't water the seeds of anger, go to this. But in a way, it buries what's there, and it confirms this kind of sense like I'm bad for feeling this. Does that make sense? So what is a really an honoring way that we can stay with what's there but wake up through it to who we are? I like as a metaphor,

something I've been using a bit for years and years and a bit tonight of if you sense yourself as an ocean that there are some patterns of waves that we've come to say, oh, this is me. And when there's a lot of reactivity, it feels strongly like me, and we do forget the vastness and the depth

and the full aliveness and the radiance and the goodness. We forget. So the practice is not to say, oh, those waves, they're not me. It's to have a way to feel the waiveness and discover the, oceanness inside it so we can sense the vastness of what we are and still honor the play of feelings, emotions, and thoughts as they're moving through, to not be exclusively identified.

So let me share with you a little more of how I worked with what was going on for me because, as I mentioned, it was just a few days ago and it was pretty strong. As you know, hurting people that you love, it can really cause a contraction. So for me, when I began working with it, the first step is always recognizing what's going on. So I started recognizing the thoughts that were going on. And the thoughts were, how could I? You know, I teach this stuff. I teach about not fixing but being present.

How could I? You know, is that kind of a feeling. And then there's, you know, thoughts that, you know, just that morning I had done my meditation and felt really open and so on. And I ended with that prayer. Please, may I live this day from loving present? my, whoever I'm in touch with, may there be kindness and understanding. You know, I had that prayer. How could I? You know, so there was that feeling. And then, or that thought, and then, you know, the feeling of bad person and this aching heaviness that I mentioned. The next step was to let

the feelings be strong enough that I could recognize, oh, this is suffering. This, I'm caught. there's a caughtness, a feeling of separate and bad and caught. There's some forgetting, there's suffering here. And I find it very useful, I sometimes call it the ouch moment, just to name, this is hard, this hurts, this is suffering. And if we can even remember, it's not my suffering, it's the suffering. The Sufis talk about the mother of this world

and that each one of us are endowed with a certain amount of the pain of the world. It's the suffering. Others experience it too. I'm not alone. So that was the first step. So feel how bad I felt and go, okay, suffering.

This is suffering. And then how do I want to relate to it? As soon as we can get, ouch, this is suffering. There's a little more space to sense how do we want to relate. Which brings us to the most basic principle with the waves.

It doesn't matter what waves are going on. what matters is how we're relating and if there's no mindfulness if we're completely absorbed in them we're identified if we're relating to the waves not from them we begin to reconnect

to a larger sense of being so for me how do I want to relate I want to relate in a way that's kind and in a way that's forgiving it does not help to condemn myself just doesn't help

It doesn't then make me set up to be a nicer person the next time. So that was the practice. And forgiveness, by the way, means you have to stay in touch with what feels so bad. You don't forgive by just doing a blanket statement, oh, forgiven, you're fine, go ahead, you know, do what you want. Forgiveness means, okay, I feel the sense, this sinking, aching, feeling of having created harm,

forgiven, forgiven, be with it with kindness. And I usually put my hand on my heart, because it helps me be more sincere and present with myself. So as I did that, there began to be this shift where that heavy aching feeling, like it became flooded with kind of a sorrow and a tenderness. And then that tenderness, if there was a voice to that tenderness,

it would have been really simply, I really wanted to feel some peace. I really wanted to feel loved. Then I could begin to ask that inquiry, is that bad person, that hurtful person who I really am? Then I could ask that with some integrity. Because then it was clear, yeah, those are waves of conditioning and they're part of this being

and they're not defining this beingness. There's love, there's awareness here. I was back in a kind of being the ocean and with the waves, not denying the waves. The more that we have that perspective then we can begin to enter the waves in a very, very whole way. We can meet them with our whole body. These are the words of poet Donna Faults,

and this is a poem called Go In and In. And it comes from a book of poetry called Go In and In. And we're going to have that available in a few weeks because her poetry is so powerful and simple. She says go in and in Be the space between two cells The vast resounding siloids in which spirit dwells Go in and in and turn away from nothing that you find

So this is the process that we feel these waves And we're not saying oh bad or oh this isn't me We go in and in We feel the ways we feel the aliveness the clutch The pain the soreness the sadness And the space that's inside everything I think many of you know that they say that 99.9% of this universe is space. Now that includes the universe inside us.

So when you go in and in to these ways of emotion and pain, if you really stay with it, with courage, you find that space, that silence, that's inside everything. Again, that's this expression of ocean-ness. You find the space, and then there's room for the, these waves. So a few comments. I'm going to have you practice this in a moment, this way of being with the aversive self and really opening up. But a few comments, which is that it begins with recognizing something's going on. If you can pause and say, oh, okay, whether you call it,

you know, Shenpa, that stickiness or identification or aversive self or reactive self, okay, something's going on. And then you choose to hang out. You pause. You say, okay, what's going on? The thoughts. You recognize the thoughts. You recognize the feelings and choose to be with forgiveness, with kindness.

Then you'll be in a space that has that presence to go in and in and find your freedom. Okay, that's the sequence. There's a poet, another poet, I'd like to mention tonight. And her name's Tara Sophia Moore, from the, West Coast. And she calls this larger truth we discover when we go through the waves and find the ocean. She says that she calls it your other names. You know, we have the name we're familiar with of the ego self, a certain set of waves. You find your other names as you open in presence. I'm going to read you. This is a little poem she wrote called the one deep inside your chest.

again, same ideas going in and in, but it's a way of paying attention. And she talks about paying attention. In this case, to the body, you might also sense to the emotional body or to the behaving self. She says, this first part is recognized. Step back and watch your body being a body.

Watch an arm move through space. Watch an ankle turn. For me, watch the thoughts play out. Watch the feelings that are going on. She says, watch your body as it likes things or doesn't, as it gets scrapes and bruises, as the skin darkens and falls into folds. Step back to the perimeter of the theater

and watch your body on the stage. Can you feel as you do the one deep inside your chest who has existed forever? Can you watch? Can you know that you're associated with? It's part of, but can you feel the one deep, inside your chest, she writes, who has existed forever, who has made a thousand journeys,

who feels like a comet in the dark, the inner filament? I know. No one ever told you. I know. It wasn't the name you learned to write at school, but that is the one, but that one is you. That one is the real you. Can you feel inside? Can you feel the deep one inside your child? Can you feel the deep one inside your chest, who has existed forever. So in a way, this is what we're talking about tonight, that we find our other names. We get caught in a narrow identity, wanting self, fearful self. And by presence, we start discovering a broader sense of our being that really is our refuge. It's our freedom. It's available to each of us. But it begins by just contacting our experience and going, oh, okay, suffering. Can I be kind?

and then deepening presence going in and in to that beingness. Again, before we practice, I want to say that when we discover that one who's always been there, that spirit, that what sometimes describes as formless essence, it actually frees us to celebrate the waves, to celebrate this particular body in its uniqueness and aliveness, to celebrate the play of emotions, and to celebrate the life that's being lived. Because what's happening is we're remembering our wholeness.

We're remembering our belonging to all of life. This is John Seuss. He writes, and he's like belonging to life. He says, to be of the earth is to know the restlessness of being a seed, the darkness of being planted, the struggle toward the light, the pain of growth into the light, the joy of bursting and bearing fruit,

the love of being food for someone, the scattering of your seeds, the decay of the seasons, the mystery of death, and the miracle of birth. We practice to wake up from this small identity and to realize our belonging to this aliveness and earth, this wholeness, and to this formless awareness that's really the one who's been here forever. So we'll close together tonight with a final reflection. Give you a chance just to explore, just three minutes short. Explore a place where you might get stuck in a more narrowed identity, a name that does not feel really good to you.

Just sense a little bit on how we open. I'd like to invite you to choose wherever you may have felt reactive with some real charge. And it might be useful to some reactivity that happens with another person because the truth that we forget, the identity we forget, when we forget our own, we forget each other.

Where might you have recently or more regularly gone into a fear reaction or judgment, hurt, blame, anger, a feeling of distance where you felt kind of stuck in a separateness. If you have a situation just to go inside it enough

so you can really with a kind of courage sense so what's it like when I'm caught in that? How does my body feel? My heart. The first all important recognition is that when you're caught

it's suffering. It's not your suffering, it's just the suffering. It's how our body minds get caught, get narrowed. So you might just in some way acknowledge that, okay, ouch, this is suffering,

the suffering. And sense how you want to relate to it. Even the intention to regard the suffering with some care, some kindness, will begin to open the door to the other names, your other true names, to that radiance. Just the intention. You might, as I did,

if it helps you to put your hand on your heart, And just sense with the touch of your hand that you're offering a forgiving, kind presence to that stuck sense of self, to that angry self, the hurt self, the victimized self, the fearful self. And notice what happens when you feel that touch and that kindness

or even the intention to be kind. Notice what happens. It can vary the touch if you'd like. It actually helps you to really, be intimate with your own experience, till you're communicating a kind presence. The beginning of a shift in identification comes with that kindness. You can find a little more space, a little more sense that who you are is not the stuck self. There's a kind of presence that's more what you are, a kind presence. So you can begin to let yourself go in and in more. Just feel the place of disturbance,

of hurt, of fear, just as sensations, as a liveliness. And just keep going in as if you're just saying yes to it with the deepest yes you know. Yes, I'll feel this. Yes, be what you are. Just experiencing it as energy in your body and see if you can begin to sense in this energy in your body some space that's inside it,

space between the cells. Again, from the poem, the one deep, inside your chest, can you feel that? Can you feel the one deep inside your chest who has existed forever, who has made a thousand journeys, who feels like a comet in the dark, the inner filament? Let's take a moment to sense, who am I, when there's this presence with what's going on? Who am I right now? And can you begin to sense a tenderness and openness, a presence? that's more the truth of who you are than any personality,

any particular emotion, any story. As Srinas Sargadatta puts it, he says, love tells me I'm everything. Wisden tells me I'm nothing. Between the two, my life flows. If you chose a situation involved in another person, you might close your reflection by sensing the other person.

and see if you can sense behind the mask, the consciousness, the aliveness, and that beingness that's also been there forever. So we close with Meta. Just take a moment to offer yourself whatever blessing you'd like tonight to close the evening. Just whatever wish naturally comes to you for your own healing and freedom, extending that heart fuel to include anyone that's come to mind in your meditation or anyone in your life right now that just naturally you want to offer some metta to some loving kindness to just sense that person in your heart seeing the spirit shining through that being offering your

blessing and we close by extending our blessings so that all of us here right now listening or listening through podcasts or watching, all of us that field of heart space, that awakening heart space, just to send our prayers to all beings. May all beings everywhere realize their deepest nature as loving presence. Inhabit that nature and live from that nature.

May there be peace on earth. May all beings everywhere awaken. and be free. Namaste. The talk you just listened to has been freely offered. If you'd like to make a donation, learn more about my schedule, or about programs offered by the Insight Meditation Community of Washington, please visit either my website, which is tarabrock.com,

our IMCW site, which is IMCW.org. Thank you very much.