Tara Brach - Meditation: Saying "Yes" to Life

Episode Date: August 19, 2021

Meditation: Saying "Yes" to Life - We are conditioned to scan for "what's wrong" and contract our body and mind in anticipation of danger. This meditation helps us undo these primal survival habits, and frees us to inhabit the full aliveness, creativity and love our natural being.

The following meditation is led by Tara Brock. To access more of my meditations or join my email list, please visit tarabrock.com. Take a few moments if you'd like to maybe adjust how you're sitting, so your posture supports meditation. The guidelines for sitting meditation are simple in the sense that the posture upright, so that there's a quality of being tall. alert and also relaxed.

Alert and relaxed. Alert and relaxed. Eyes are closed unless you'd prefer to have them open. That's fine too. There's no rules on it. Often the mind quiets more easily with the eyes closed. You might feel this life breath and feel it at your heart and bring a kind of inner listening to your heart, sensing what mood is here, perhaps deepening that listening,

and sensing what brings you to meditation practice, what your intention is. This is really that exploration of what most matters to you. What is it you want to cultivate in your own heart and presence? It's feeling your sincerity. And we open together as community with a simple chant. The chanting kind of takes us beyond our cognitive mind and lets the heart really carry us. You might bring the palms together, touching gently in front of the heart. The mantra is Om, which is a universal sound current of connectedness.

We'll chant it three times. So you might begin by inhaling really deeply. filling the chest and lungs. One of the main gateways to presence is to wake up in our body. It's recognizing what's going on inside our body with a very gentle, friendly attention. And I find it helpful to start by sensing a wide open sky around me that's filled with the curve of a smile. So just envisioning that curve of a smile spreading through the sky, receptive and open

and bright, and letting the mind merge with that sky. So the mind is that sky-like awareness filled with the attitude, atmosphere of a smile. Let the eyes be soft and sense of a smile spreading. through the eyes, lifting the outer corners, and the brow is smooth, sensing that atmosphere of receptivities that's allowing all the sensations in the brow, the eyes to be felt, no resistance, just allowing. In a similar way, you can let the mouth be in a half-smile. The Zen teacher Ticknat Han calls this smile yoga.

Because it sends a message to the whole nervous system to relax. You might even sense the inside of the mouth smiling. Tongue fill the lower palate, relaxing right down to the root of the tongue and then opening to all the sensations that fill your mouth, the tongue, the gums, the teeth, lips, receptive, allowing the life that's here to fully express. You might let the shoulders fall away from the ears and then fill the shoulders with awareness. Imagine and sense that whatever tightness or tension is there can float in awareness. So there's a very allowing presence.

Notice if the hands can rest in a very easy and effortless way. perhaps softening them, softening and then feeling from the inside out the aliveness that plays through the hands. Can you soften and feel tingling, vibrating? The eyes are still soft, smiling, the mouth smiling. You might smile into the heart. feeling, imagining, seeing the curve of a smile spread through the heart. And this isn't to cover over anything but to make room for what's here in a very friendly, gentle

presence. Notice what happens when you say yes to the feelings in the heart area, relaxing down into the belly. You might visualize and sense the curve of a smile spreading through that region, letting this next breath be received in a softening belly. This breath and now this one, and again and again, allowing yourself to feel the life, the sensations, vibrations, aliveness in the whole region of the belly, saying yes. The eyes are still soft, sensing the smile in the mouth and smile at the heart and the belly, opening to the sensations in the pelvic region, and again visualizing, feeling the curve

of a smile spread through you, making room for the life that's here. fully receptive, yes to the life that's here, aware of the energy and sensation and the legs right down into the feet, feet, the hands, simultaneously feeling all parts of the body lit up with energy filled with awareness. Notice what it's like to say yes to this whole changing dance of sensation, not opposing anything, not controlling anything. If you find the mind contracts into thought forms, when you become aware of thinking of that kind of virtual reality, then gently pause. Just notice the thoughts and then reopen back into this aliveness.

Perhaps aware of the sounds around you, can re-relax the body and feel the aliveness of sensation inside you. Care of the sensations of the breath, the gentle inflow and outflow. Let your practice be simple to notice when the mind has drifted and gently arrive again right here, feeling the aliveness in the body. of the movement of the breath, and in the background this alert, inner stillness, that which is aware your own formless, true nature right here. If something pleasant or unpleasant strongly calls your attention, sensations or emotions,

to notice what it's like in your body and say yes, let the life that's here be here. noticing how it changes, if it feels difficult bringing a real quality of kindness, a gentleness, perhaps breathing with what's happening, letting the breath be an anchor and the kindness give you some space, moment to moment, noticing what's happening and saying yes, allowing life to be just as it is. Two questions that can really guide you on the path. The first is what is happening right now inside me? And second is, and can I be with this?

Can I say yes to the life that's here? Notice whatever is predominant right now in your throat or your chest, your belly. You might explore and sense what happens when you're going to be. deepen that yes, when you truly let be, when there's an unconditional yes to the life that's here. We close with a verse from the poet, Dana Faults. It's called White Dove. In the shared quiet, an invitation arises like a white dove lifting from a limb and taking flight. Come and live in truth. Take your place in the flow of grace. Draw aside the veil you thought would always separate your heart from love.

All you ever longed for is before you in this moment, if you dare draw inner breath and whisper yes.