Tara Brach - Meditation: Opening to the River of Aliveness

Episode Date: February 2, 2023

Meditation: Opening to the River of Aliveness - This meditation guides us to awaken to sensation using the image of a smile and scanning through the body. We then open to sound and to the entire changing flow of experience. When we connect with the changing flow of sensations, feelings and sounds, we also discover the formless awareness that is our Source… and home.

The following meditation is led by Tara Brock. To access more of my meditations or join my email list, please visit tarabrock.com. We begin with a meditation and I'd like to invite you to come into whatever posture will best serve you, feeling relaxed and awake, and let yourself settle in, coming into stillness and letting the attention go within. Key gateway to presence is through awakening this body's awareness

and it can be very valuable to use the image of a smile as a way of relaxing and opening through the body. You might first visualize a smile spreading through a great, wide-open sky, great sky and the curve of a smile spreading through a great sky, kind of a curve of a smile, spreading through it, and just sensing that openness and receptivity of a smile, the brightness, the aliveness, and letting the mind merge with that sky

as if the top of your head is wide open. So you can feel that smile spreading through your whole mind, brightening the mind, uplifting, relaxing, You might sense the smile spreading in a very immediate way through the eyes, that the outside corners of the eyes will lift it up a bit. The eyes can soften naturally, the brow, smooth, sensing with the receptivity of a smile, the sensations and aliveness free to move through the whole region of the brow, inviting a slight smile to the mouth. and feeling the inside of the mouth and a smile

and sensing the sensations and aliveness through the whole area of the mouth, tongue, the gums, the teeth, the lips, the eyes are smiling, soft, the mouth. You might visualize and sense the curve of a smile through the throat and sense an openness and receptivity there. sensations free to move the aliveness there the eyes are soft

smiling the mouth the throat inviting a smile to spread through the heart and the chest area sensing the receptivity and openness of a smile that whole atmosphere spreading through the chest

widening rings of relaxation and ease so that the shoulders are free to relax back and down some. Lensing the awareness filling the shoulders and the movement and aliveness of sensation inside the shoulders. And if it feels tight or nodded to let that float in awareness, the hands resting in an easy and effortless way, you might soften the hands.

And notice how much aliveness you can feel when the hands soften. from inside out. Can you sense the tingling, vibrating? The eyes are smiling, the mouth, throat, and the heart. You can soften through the belly and sense the curve of a smile spreading through the belly. Sensing the space that's created, allowing sensations to move and be felt, energy flowing in the belly. imagine and sense awareness filling the whole belly

in the same way letting that curve of a smile spread through the pelvic region creating a sense of space allowing for aliveness to emerge movement of energy the volume of the legs and the sensations and aliveness inside the legs right down into the feet see if you can feel the feet from the inside out

tingling and vibrating there, tingling and vibrating in the hands. This whole body is a field of sensation, not opposing anything. Just letting this life live through you. This river of sensation, ceaselessly vibrating, tingling, flowing, let it live through you. Sensing how the river of aliveness includes the play of sound. perhaps the close-in sounds appearing and disappearing. These words, sounds in the room,

more distant sounds, letting the sounds wash through you, just letting go over and over into this river of sound and sensation. Noticing, is anything standing still? It's anything not moving, completely relaxing with this ever-changing dance of sound and sensation, just be this river of aliveness.

You'll notice at some point that the mind pulls away from this dancing aliveness into thought forms. When you become aware of that, it's an opportunity to come back home again, to practice returning again to what's right here. Just notice the thoughts and gently reopen the attention, aware of the sounds, this changing symphony that's right here.

You might soften through the body a little, smiling into the eyes, the mouth, the heart, feeling the aliveness, flow of sensation, so that you're listening to and feeling the whole moment, letting this life live through you, relaxing back into this river of aliveness. Wherever the mind is gone, you can always start fresh and relax back. Listening, relaxing and feeling the body, the sensations that are here, saying yes to the currents of life that are living through you. kindness, with courage, letting go, being this river of aliveness.

Where of the changing flow of sound, sensation, and feeling, and also aware in the background of that alert inner stillness, that timeless presence that includes this river of aliveness, that which is your true home, awake, open-hearted present.