Tara Brach - Guided Meditation: Cultivating a Relaxed Attentiveness

Episode Date: March 15, 2014

2014-03-12 - Guided Meditation: Cultivating a Relaxed Attentiveness

Take a moment if you'd like to adjust how you're sitting. And when I say adjust, meaning finding a posture that you feel will support you for the next 25 minutes or so. And some of the guidelines for the sitting posture are simply that the back is erect, that there's a quality of sitting tall. So you might just close your eyes and feel that sense of uprightness. And this supports the inner quality of being a lot. alert, being awake. And the other aspect of the sitting posture is to be relaxed, which means you just take a moment to sense if there's habitual tension in the body that you might,

just by noticing it, let go a little. Just let go a little. It can help to take a few long, deep breaths. And let's breathe together. We'll start by inhaling deeply, filling the chest, filling the lungs, nice full in breath. And then a slow out breath. Slow enough so you can feel the sensations of releasing the breath. And then breathing in again, filling the chest and the lungs, breathing in more than normal. And again, that slow conscious out breath.

Just feel an actual sense of releasing, letting go, letting go. And once again, inhaling deeply. Slow out breath, softening down the length of the body, letting go, letting go. And then allowing the breath to go back to its natural rhythm and just feel a sense of being able to rest with the breath, relax with the breath. You might notice an increased sense of presence, of being here, and just allowing there to be an inquiry in that presence,

of what really brings you here tonight. This is an inquiry about your intention. What is your intention? What matters to you? Just listening to the heart, finding that place of sincerity where you're connected with what's important to you. Just beginning with a listening attention,

opening to sounds. If you're listening into the space around you, space around you, listening into the space of the room, listening not just with your ears but with your whole awareness, you're listening in a global way, just letting all the sounds wash through you, sensing perhaps the most distant sounds you can perceive in the space of awareness that includes even those sounds. So there's nothing to do. Sounds arise and they're notice spontaneously, relaxed, receptive, listening attention. In the same way that we listen to sound, we can listen to and feel the aliveness of this body,

just allowing it to flow through us, to dance. You might listen to and feel the region of the eyes and just let there be a softening. noticing if you soften there's more aliveness, relaxing the jaw, feeling the tongue, the gums, the teeth, the lips, feeling them from the inside so that you're listening to and receiving sensation, feeling the awareness inside the shoulders. Again, that receptivity that senses the space and aliveness, the movement, the tightness, just letting it all float,

listening to and feeling the shoulders from the inside, letting the awareness fill the hands. Again, that same receptivity of listening. You might soften the hands a little. Then notice what you feel. Sense the intimacy of presence when there's that receptivity of listening, just letting life happen. The tingling, the vibrating.

pressure pulsing. Let there be an openness at the chest. Again, filling the chest with awareness, receptive to the aliveness there, the space. And if you sense in the chest area, the heart area, any tightness or contraction, just let it float,

just as awareness allows sounds to come and go, just allowing the sensations and feelings in the chest. to be as they are. Scanning down into the belly and letting the awareness fill the belly. You might soften a little there. Perhaps let this next breath be received in a softening belly. This breath, and then this one, and again, receptive to the aliveness that's deep in the torso.

Sand says you soften the belly, feeling from the inside out how much life is there, Continuing to scan down, feeling the area of the genitals, the buttocks, pelvic region. Again, filled with awareness, receptive, allowing. See, you're open to this dance of aliveness, letting it play through you, scanning down the legs, feeling the aliveness inside the legs, letting the feet be filled with awareness, feeling the feet from the inside, receptive to the legs,

the play of sensations there. You might widen the attention to feel this whole body simultaneously as a field of sensation and just let everything happen, not opposing anything, changing dance, heat or cool, flow or tightness, tingling, vibrating, pulsing, resting in the awareness, resting in the awareness, awareness that recognizes and allows this whole dance. It might include sounds also, this whole vibratory world, that you're listening to and feeling the whole moment. Sensing this relaxed listening presence as home, the awake space that allows this whole world to arise and dissolve.

It's natural to leave this openness, You'll notice the mind very quickly find something in the future or the past, an idea, a comment to narrow and fixate on. Not to judge that in any way. The practice is just to notice when that contracting or narrowing into thought happens. And in the noticing, re-relax open. and relax back into that listening and that allowing, disentangling from a thought by simply listening to the sound that's here, the real sounds moment to moment, disentangling from thoughts

by relaxing and recognizing what's going on in your body right now, perhaps softening the shoulders and the hands, relaxing the heart, relaxing back into that, listening. listening presence. Mind has wandered to, you can re-enter or reopen to mindfulness in a moment. Just to simply notice that you've been off in some of a thinking trance and gently, and with interest, reopen the attention to what's right here. Just listen, the sounds that are right here instead of the tapes in the mind. Perhaps softening again, letting go a little more in the body. And noticing as you relax in the body,

perhaps the shoulders, hands, and the belly, how much more you can feel. You might sense a softening or an opening in the heart area. Just listen to and connect with the life that's there. So there's an inhabiting of a more whole awareness, receptive, kindly awake, right here.