Tara Brach - Meditation: Coming Home to Natural Presence (2019-11-20)

Episode Date: November 22, 2019

Meditation: Coming Home to Natural Presence (2019-11-20) - This meditation awakens our senses through a body scan and listening to sound, and then invites us to rest in the presence that spontaneously knows the changing stream of experience. Relaxing back and letting everything be just as it is, reveals the natural presence that is our true home. Join Tara's email community at http://eepurl.com/6YfI, to receive exclusive updates, events, and meditations. - Get a free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease," - plus a bonus gift: "8 Essential Tips to Nourish Your Meditation Practice."

The following meditation is led by Tara Brock. To access more of my meditations or join my email list, please visit tarabrock.com. If you're new to practice, you might explore sitting very upright, tall, so from the base of your spine right up to the top of the head, it's like a string and then drawing up higher towards the heavens. You're sitting upright and as relaxed as well as you're. possible. Like a tree, let the limbs relax, be at ease, find that sense of balance and stability. Feeling the life breath as it flows in and out and let yourself bring your attention to the area of the heart. Bring a listening attention to the area of the heart.

wherever you've been over these last hours, sense that you're bringing an intimate presence to your own heart right now. And as you listen, I might inquire, what is it that most matters to me? What brings me to meditation? What is my heart long for? Sense what you feel most sincere about when you contact your aspiration or intention when it's deep, there's a kind of innocence

and sincerity that comes with it. You know it really matters to your heart and spirit. We can sense collectively as community our shared wish that these hearts awaken and that awakening ripple out to be healing for our personal. planet for all beings, letting your awareness scan through your body, noticing any areas of tightness or holding. When you find those areas, let them rest in awareness, sense that they can float in awareness. There may be a natural softening, loosening, letting go. You might pay particular attention to the area around the eyes.

When we're thinking a lot or when we're stressed, we tend to tighten those little micro-muscles so to soften around the eyes and let the brow be smooth, relaxing the jaw, letting it unhinge. You might bring a slight smile to the lips and feeling the tongue letting it fill the lower palate, relaxing the tongue right down to the root and becoming aware of the sensations that fill the mouth, the tongue, the gums, teeth, the lips and letting your awareness spread through your face, relaxed and awake, feel the scalp and the skull, the back of the neck, perhaps a sense of softening, letting the throat fill the neck and letting the shoulders fall

away from the neck and feel that whole band of the shoulders and the neck. Again, letting any tension or tightness float in awareness, soften naturally in awareness. Notice if you can feel the float. the flow of energy that moves through the arms and see if you can let the hands rest in a very easy way, a very effortless way. Noticing if you soften the hands and then soften again, how much can you feel inside the hands? Can you feel the tingling and vibrating that's there? Let there be an openness of the chest and feel inside the chest as if you feel the tingling and you feel the tingling, you could bring your whole awareness to fill the area of the chest, feeling the heart from

the inside out. What does the region of the heart feel like? I'm feeling the upper back. Again, letting sensations move and flow, softening in the space of awareness. Scanning down the torso, feeling the mid-area of the abdomen. mid-back, relaxing and opening to the energy that's there, lower back, pelvic region, feeling from the inside out the energy and aliveness, let the awareness fill the legs, the length, the volume, the weight of the legs, and place your awareness inside your feet and see if you can notice

the tingling and the vibrating there, sensing and imagining the great earth, and imagining the earth body, infinitely deep, the vast volume of the earth, the energy and aliveness of the earth, and letting that energy flow through you, through your feet, through the base of your spine, filling your body. So if you widen the lens, you can sense this whole field of sensation, this whole dance of aliveness, letting everything be just as it is, widening further to include sound. So you're listening with your full awareness, sensations and sound, known spontaneously by awareness, sensation and sound, unfolding moment by moment in this vast field, this edgeless space of awareness.

Let everything happen. that wakeful openness, changing experience of sound and sensation, feelings, all occurring in this vast stillness, getting familiar with this quality of presence itself. It's quite natural that the mind contracts and drifts around in thought forms. you notice that you've been in a virtual reality of thinking, it's an opportunity to reawaken, to come home again to presence. Just gently reopen the attention. You might mentally note thinking, thinking, and rediscover the sounds that are happening right

here, listening to and feeling the aliveness in your body, this breath, letting the sound senses be wide awake, aware of that background presence, that alert inner stillness that spontaneously recognizes what's happening, moment to moment, your natural awareness. And if the mind is very busy and it helps support you in presence, you might let yourself rest gently with the movement of the breath, relaxed and awake. No matter how far the mind drifts you can always find your way back home, reawakening your senses, listening, sensing what I want to let go in the body, relaxing your heart and resting in this natural presence that includes the different waves of sound and sensation, feelings, moment to moment, a letting

go of what is past and letting go of what may come, and letting go of what is happening now, relaxing back into presence, letting everything be just as it is.