Tara Brach - Meditation: Letting Thought Clouds Come and Go

Episode Date: October 5, 2023

Meditation: Letting Thought Clouds Come and Go  - This meditation guides us through a body scan and into a relaxed, open presence. When we realize we are lost in a thought cloud, our practice is to relax open, listening to and feeling the life of the present moment. We are training to become increasingly aware of the gap between thoughts, the space where the light of awareness shines through. "It's in that gap between thoughts that the light shines through – this mystery, this living mystery of what's right here… opening to and relaxing into the life that's right here." ~ Tara

The following meditation is led by Tara Brock. To access more of my meditations or join my email list, please visit tarabrock.com. In the stillness, you might gently scan through your body and notice if there's any areas of obvious tension and tightness. See if it's possible to soften a little and then slowly bringing the attention to the area of the brow. Just let the brow be smooth, softening the eyes, feeling back to the scalp and the skull, relaxing and feeling the sensations there. Let the jaw be unhinged. You might sense a slight smile at the mouth, relaxing down to the root of the tongue, noticing

the sensations of letting the tongue fill the lower palate. the sensations that fill the whole mouth, the teeth, the gums. Feeling the area of the throat from the inside out, letting the throat fill the neck. Feeling the sensations that arise naturally there. Letting the shoulders relax back and down some. Let the awareness fill your shoulders. So you can feel from the inside out, and you might imagine a melting, melting sensation, ice to water. See if you can feel that inside out. Ice to water and then

water to gas, becoming aware of the energy that flows up and down the arms, letting the hands rest in a completely easy way, effortless, light. You might soften the hands and soften again and feel the aliveness from the inside out. It's tingling, the vibrating, perhaps pulsing. Just as a cup is filled with water. This whole body is filled with awareness. Let there be an openness to the chest. Let the awareness fill the heart area.

feeling the heart from the inside out. What's it like? You feel aliveness or squeezing or flow, heat, pressure, still letting the hands be very soft, loosening down into the belly. Letting this next breath be received in a softening belly. This breath and now this one and this one and again. Feeling the belly from the inside out, the whole play of sensations there. Relaxing through the pelvic region, filling the pelvic region with awareness. So you can feel again from the inside out the movement of sensation, the aliveness that's there. See if you can feel the length and the volume of your legs and let your feet fill with awareness.

sensing the sensations, warmth, aliveness it's there. You might sense the vast earth beneath these feet, sensing contact and pressure and imagining and sensing the energy, this earth energy moving through your whole body, as part of the you're flowing upward, filling you. The energy that extends in all directions in front of you as far out as the most distant stars just imagining that space in front of you and behind you extending as far as the distant stars. Infinite space to either sides as far as the distant stars. and above as far as the distant stars.

Sensing this body is a field of sensation and aliveness and open and just let everything happen. Changing dance of sensation, you can open the attention to include sound too. Sounds around you, soft sounds, the more distant sounds. The whole play of sound and sensation, happening in and received by its vast and open awareness,

simply resting in open presence, presence including this changing flow, sound and sensation, feelings. At some point you'll notice the mind has drifted from this open presence into a thought form. It's like a cloud being inside a cloud. that's a perfect opportunity to practice waking up, reopening the attention, relaxing back into that sky-like openness that is aware of the sensations that are here, sounds, the life of the

moment. Once you wake up from a thought, you realize you are not the thought. You don't have to believe your thoughts. You can rest in that openness that's larger than thoughts and let the clouds come and go. You might notice right now, am I inside a cloud of thought? If you notice you are without any judgment, with interest, gentleness, relax open, Relax open into the space that's here that's listening to sound, that open awareness that's including the sensations, the aliveness of the body.

Let's feel this living, breathing body. Know that you're here again, letting the clouds come and go. In these last few minutes, you might explore the gap between thoughts. It's in that gap between thoughts that the light shines through. This mystery, this living mystery of what's right here, opening to and relaxing into the life that's right here. No matter if you're inside a cloud again, you can always start fresh and let go,

relax back and discover this. this vibrant aliveness and the gap between thoughts, the space where the light shines through.