Tara Brach - Meditation: Living Presence – with Body Scan (2021-07-15)

Episode Date: July 15, 2021

Meditation: Living Presence – with Body Scan (2021-07-15) - A key pathway to full presence is awakening through the body. This meditation guides us through a body scan, relaxing and receiving the play of sensations. We then deepen attention to the breath, and rest with the rhythmic waves of breathing, experiencing the background of the whole domain of physical aliveness.

The following meditation is led by Tara Brock. To access more of my meditations or join my email list, please visit tarabrock.com. One of the direct gateways to presence is waking up our attention in a relaxed way through the body. You might begin by sensing the area of the brow, the eyes. And as if you could smile into the eyes, sense the outside corners of the eyes uplifted some.

The eyes soft, the brow smooth, and receptive to the sensations, the aliveness in the region of the eyes. You might let that receptivity spread feeling the scalp and the skull, the sensations that arise, smile at the mouth, the inside of the mouth smiling, and then the receptivity to the sensations in the tongue, the gums, the teeth, the lips. You might imagine the throat filling the neck. And then feeling in a receptive way the sensations and the liveliness in the neck, letting the shoulders fall away from the neck. See, if you can feel the shoulders in the inside out, imagining perhaps a dissolving or melting sensation,

ice to water, water to gas. And again a receptivity to the aliveness, the movement of sensations in the shoulders, and the volume of the arms, letting the hands rest in a very easy and effortless way and softening the hands, feeling the hands, from the inside out and with an intimate attention, receiving the aliveness that's there.

Notice if you can sense tingling, vibrating in the hands, pulsing, warmth, letting there be an openness to the chest area and sensing, visualizing, feeling a smile spreading through the whole heart area. This is not to paper over what's there but rather to create space for the life that's here. Feeling from the inside out, the region of the heart, really receptive to the sensations and the energy that's moving, expressing in the heart area. Scanning down the body and feeling the belly,

softening the belly. You might again visualize and sense a smile spreading through the area of the belly. Let this next breath, be received in a softening belly. This breath and now this one and again, feeling from the inside out, the aliveness that fills the whole abdominal region, continuing to scan down, feeling the pelvic region and again you might imagine, visualize and sense the curve of a smile and with a receptive attention, feeling the aliveness, the sensations in the

pelvic region, the weight, the volume of the legs, feeling the feet from the inside out, receptive to the play of sensations there, tingling, vibrating, pressure, temperature, and widening the lens so you can feel simultaneously this whole field of sensation, sometimes described as the energy body, this ever-changing dance. of warmth and coolness, of tingling, vibrating, pulsing, tightness or flow. Just letting everything happen. You might sense in the midst of this field of sensation, the sensations of the river of the breath,

the inflow and outflow of the breath, with a receptive attention, letting the sensations of the breath be in the foreground, the whole field of bodily sensations, the great sea of sensations in the background, resting with the breath wherever you feel it most easily, wherever it's either most pleasant or most natural to attend. Might be the inflow, outflow at the nostrils,

or the rising falling at the chest, perhaps expanding and deflating at the belly. Or for some it's the sense of the whole body breathing. breathing, opening with the inflow of the breath, and settling with the outflow, even on a cellular level. You might sense how much you can relax with the movement of the breath, the waves of the breath in the foreground, this ocean of changing sensation in the background. When you notice the mind has moved off into thoughts, let the practice be quite simply, one of re-arriving gently without any judgment. Take a moment to pause, to relax open the attention,

aware of the sounds around you, perhaps re-relaxing a bit through the body, loosening and softening the shoulders, letting the hands rest in a soft and easy way, feeling the life that's there, chest open, the belly soft, landing again gently on the next in-breath or out-breath, relaxing with the movement of the life breath. Each time the mind wanders is an opportunity to practice arriving again, arriving in presence, re-relaxing, gently reconnecting with the breath, and sensing the whole field of sensation, the relaxed attentiveness moment to moment, relaxing with the movement of the breath, sensing the background of aliveness, sensing the living

presence that's right here, moment to moment.