Tara Brach - Guided Meditation: Choiceless Awareness

Episode Date: November 21, 2013

2013-11-20 Guided Meditation: Choiceless Awareness

And you may close your eyes. And after you close your eyes, make any other subtle adjustments in how you're sitting. So the posture is upright. So you're sitting tall. So you have that quality of being alert. And also at ease. So right from the start, you might ask yourself,

as there's any way you can just relax a little bit more? We'll begin by just breathing together, the invitations to take a very long, extended in breath. So breathing in, filling the lungs, and then a slow out breath. Since as you're breathing out, this possibility of just letting go, letting go, letting go. And then another full-in breath, filling the lungs, and a slow out breath as you're breathing out, releasing, relaxing outward, letting go. And then again, if you're breathing out, And again, inhaling deeply, filling the lungs.

You might even hold a bit once you're full of breath. Hold, feel that, and a very slow out breath, softening down the length of the body, letting go, letting go, letting go. Just letting the breath be in its natural rhythm now. you might notice the increased sense of presence, just from a short bit of mindfully collecting the attention. Let your senses be awake, that there's a listening quality, listening to the sounds that are here,

so that you're aware of the sensations that are moving through the body, and bring a gentle listening to the heart. Just notice whatever the state of the heart is right now, whatever mood is here, Without any judgment, just begin kind of a more intimate attending. So you're aware if there's tightness, tension, or if there's more openness, flow, if there's numbness, or if there's a lot of sensitivity, sadness, happiness. Just keep listening in and sensing if the heart could express itself.

What would be the heart's intention for the evening? What is your heart most wish for or long for this evening? What matters to your heart? In this presence with heart and caring, you can gently bring the palms together. We'll chant the mantra oom, sound current oom, that sound current of connectus. We'll chant three times just to feel it as an expression of your heart,

of your aspiration. Please inhale deeply. You can deepen presence by relaxing and awakening very directly through the body. And I often like to begin though with the image of a smile imagining the sky around you, a great open blue sky, let that curve of a smile spread through that vastness. So you can sense that openness and receptivity, letting the mind mind merge with that sky so that a smile can fill the mind and then letting the sense of a smile spread through the eyes, feeling the corners of the eyes up a bit, the eyes soft, brow smooth,

and just feel that region, the eyes and the brow, the sensations that are there, very receptive presence, slight smile at the mouth. You might feel the inside of the mouth smiling, the jaw, unhinged, again a receptive attention, feeling the sensations at the mouth, the lips, tongue, sense the aliveness in the face. You might feel the breath at the throat, breathing in and out, slight smile spreading through this throat. And just allow yourself to feel the sensations that are there. In the same way, let a smile spread through the heart area, smiling into the heart. So you can visualize and sense that curve, that receptivity, not to cover over anything, but to create the space,

to feel the life just as it is in the heart area. The eyes are soft, slight smile at the mouth, and smile at the heart. Just sensing the space and aliveness in the heart area, sensing a widening out of that space and aliveness to include the shoulders. You might allow the shoulders just to relax back and down a little bit. And then feeling the shoulders from the inside out, see how much you can detect the movement of sensation, letting a soft attention be there,

which might allow for a bit of a dissolving or melting and untangling. See if you can place the whole awareness inside the region of the upper arms. Feeling from the inside out the life that's there. Scanning down through the lower arms and letting the awareness fill the hands. Just feeling from the inside out, can you notice as you soften the hands the tingling or vibrating that's there? See if you can soften just a little bit more. very receptive, intimate attention. You might feel quivering or pulsing or tingling inside the hands.

In this same way you can bring an intimate attention through the whole body. Just as a cup can be filled with water, this whole body is filled with awareness, space and aliveness, the chest let it be open, Again, feeling from the inside out, pounding, the throbbing, the tingling, the vibrating. The space inside and around everything. It might bring that curve of a smile to the navel area. It's a bit below the navels, the Don Tian, this area, again another chakra in the Sanskrit system, full of aliveness.

So, smiling, feeling that smile through the navel. the navel, softening, opening, letting this next breath be received in a softening belly, this breath and then this one, feeling the aliveness deep into the torso, hips, buttocks and genitals, filled with awareness, aliveness, space, feeling the region of the upper legs filled with awareness, scanning down the legs, the lower legs, and letting the awareness fill the feet, you can feel the feet from the inside out, movement of energy, tingling, vibrating. I might feel the feet and also soften the hands and feel how the energy fills the hands

and widening the lens and just letting this whole body be filled with awareness, filled with aliveness. Sensing the body is a field of sensation. Can you feel this field simultaneously, all parts of the body. all parts, not stopping anything, not opposing anything, including an awareness, this dancing field of sensation as well as the play of sound, listening. It's nothing to do. Sounds are known spontaneously by awareness, resting in the awareness that's listening to sound, listening to and feeling this changing dance of sensations,

sensing how this whole play of life is flowing through you, letting go of any agenda to make something happen, to have a certain kind of experience, simply letting life be just as it is. When you notice there's a contraction into doing, into following a thought form, in other words, when you leave presence and notice that in the recognizing, you might notice thinking, thinking,

or planning or remembering, just recognize and then pause and relax back, aware of what's right here, relaxing back and resting again and again as the awareness that knows nothing to do, just letting life be as it is. is drifted, just gently notice that. Just notice the virtual reality and then gently relax open again back into this heerness, this vividness and mystery, this flow of aliveness right here, relaxing and listening to this play of sound, noticing the sounds, the movement of sensations through the body, especially if you relax a little, the shoulders, soften the hands, soften the belly, wounds and sensations, feelings in the foreground. And in the background, this

alert, inner stillness, our own presence, in the last few moments just resting as presence, the silence that's listening to sound, the openness that everything is in the openness that everything is happening in. Loiceless awareness. Nothing to do. Resting as awareness.