Tara Brach - Meditation: Surrender into Living Presence

Episode Date: January 16, 2025

In this guided meditation we begin with a body scan, and rest in awareness with our senses awake. The key practice is to recognize when the mind immerses in virtual reality, reawaken our senses, and surrender again and again into the immediacy, vibrance and mystery of living presence.

The following meditation is led by Tara Brock. To access more of my meditations or join my email list, please visit tarabrock.com. As you sit here, feel this body breathing, and you might let yourself feel the breath in the domain of the heart. Just to feel your heart a little more directly right now. We'll open together with a simple reflection of what is your deepest intention

for practice right now, for this practice of meditation? What is it your heart most longs for? Listen inwardly to where you feel most sincere. It's a real gift to your spirit just to get in touch with what matters. What do you care about? Feeling what matters to us

and sensing our collective aspiration that we may wake up these hearts and minds and have that awakening ripple out to be part of the healing of our world. One of the most direct gateways to waking up is to bring our attention right into the body, inside out. We begin by scanning downward. You might be aware of the eyes and let us. them soften, let the brow be smooth, even imagine smiling into the eyes, letting the outside corners lift a bit, when we're very caught in our thoughts, all those micro-muscles around

the eyes tense up a bit. So this helps to soften and relax the mind through the body, slight smile at the mouth, let the inside side of the mouth be smiling. Become aware of the sensations in the tongue, gums, teeth and lips, smiling at the eyes and the mouth. You feel the sensations throughout the face, perhaps a bit of tingling or vibrating, maybe a bit of darkness and light, the eyes. And become aware of your scalp and your skull and sense. inside of the scalp and the skull.

Become aware of the head and the space and the aliveness inside the whole head. You might imagine the throat filling the neck. So your neck and throat area become awake with sensation. Notice if you can let the shoulders fall away from the neck. Let the awareness fill the shoulders and just become aware if there's any tightness or tension, that you can let it float a bit in awareness. See if it naturally loosens, softens. Let the hands rest in an easy and effortless way.

And see if you can bring the awareness inside the hands, you can feel the thumb from the inside out, the tingling and the vibrating there, and then the forefinger, There's a space inside the forefinger, the aliveness, middle finger, and you feel sensations, the ring finger and the pinky. Sense the space between the fingers. Sense the space between the palms and the backs of the hands. And see if you can feel the hands just as a vibrating dance of sensation, just as a cup is filled with water. This whole body is filled with awareness, letting the chest be open and feeling the

awareness and sensation in the heart area. You might explore what happens when you visualize and sense the curve of a smile spreading through the area of the heart and chest, making room for what's there, not covering over, softening, relaxing in the upper back, loosening and softening in the belly, letting this next breath be received in a softening belly, this breath, and now this one, and again, waking up the awareness deep in the torso, relaxing the mid and the lower back, letting the awareness wake up through the whole pelvic region, aware of the legs, the length, the volume, and feeling the feet, the places of pressure and warmth. where your feet contact the floor, feeling the awareness inside the feet, feel the tingling

and vibrating there, the hands still soft, vibrating, and widening the lens and sensing this whole body all at once, this energy body, like a dance of sensation, a field of sensation, not stopping anything or controlling anything, just resting in that away. that spaciousness that includes this whole field of sensation, resting in the awareness that's listening to sound, listening to and feeling the changing flow moment to moment, sensing the vividness and the immediacy of this presence that's right here beyond any thought or idea, living presence to support you and feeling at home in this presence, you might sense the movement of the breath in the foreground and relaxing with the inflow and outflow, let your refuge

be just what's right here moment to moment. Just these sounds and these sensations, this experience of the life breath, notice the possibility of relaxing with what's happening. It's a kind of surrendering into the changing flow, moment by moment, breath, by breath. At some point you might notice the mind has left this living presence and gone into a kind of virtual reality of thinking. It's totally natural. It's what the mind does. And it's also natural to notice it and to gently reopen the attention, noticing the sounds that are here that are actually right here instead of the narrative in the mind, re-relaxing and feeling the body, the shoulders, the hands, the belly,

and relaxing your heart, gently surrendering back into what's right here, noticing the difference between any thought, ideas of the future, the past, and this living presence, the mystery, and aliveness, it's right here, breath by breath. You might ask yourself, am I dreaming and perhaps become aware of the veil of thinking that is between us and this living reality, this awake heart and mind? Just to gently notice that and reopen the senses. listening, feeling the life in the body, perhaps softened the hands, slight smile in the mouth, relaxing your heart, and again surrendering into the changing flow, sounds and sensations,

feelings, emotions, and sensing in the background that wakeful presence, that alert inner stillness That's really our essence. From the poet Wu Men, 10,000 flowers in spring. The moon in autumn, a cool breeze in summer, snow in winter. If your mind isn't clouded by unnecessary things, this is the best season of your life.