Tara Brach - Meditation: The Heartspace of Gratitude

Episode Date: June 23, 2021

Meditation: The Heartspace of Gratitude - When gratitude for our life arises, we enter the sacred space of an open heart. This meditation guides us in arriving in presence and awakening the blessings of gratitude.

The following meditation is led by Tara Brock. To access more of my meditations or join my email list, please visit tarabrock.com. Wherever you are, take some moments to adjust your posture. So you're setting yourself in a way that allows you to feel awake and alert. There's a quality of sitting or whatever posture you're in, upright. alert, and also at ease. When you've settled in your position, you might let your body become still and let your attention go inward. So you become increasingly aware and the inside out of what the experience is right now. For many that it'll help to close your eyes or

let your gaze be downcast. Be aware of being part of this earth, being connected to this earth, feeling grounded. Feeling where your feet contact the floor, sense of weight and pressure. There's the gravitational field of the earth, the hug of gravity. Just feel your connection, your belonging, the safety, like as if you're a mountain and just really stable. And you might become aware of this life breath moving in and out. And feel the breath. And perhaps relax with the breath a bit.

Let the breath be a way of collecting your attention. So that as you breathe in, there's an opening to receive. Like really sensing that you're letting in and being touched by the prana, the life force of this universe. And with the out breath, just to let and go, releasing. As you breathe, you might invite a sense of the smile, the curve of a smile to the lips. It can be very slight. It has the effect of activating that kind of ease and well-being that's possible.

It calms down, fight, flight, freeze. and you might let it spread into your eyes so that the corners, the outside corners of the eyes are lifted up some, the eyes are soft and the brow is smooth and let the sense of a smile spread through the face so all the micro muscles in your face can soften and be at ease. You might feel tingling or vibrating the scalp or skull. You might be aware of the throat, let the throat fill the neck. So you can feel the aliveness and sensations there. And it can be helpful to just visualize and sense of smile spreading through the throat,

relaxing and opening to the life that's there. You can let that smile spread through the heart, through the chest area. It's not to cover over, but to really make sense. space for what's here. So you're visualizing the curve of a smile and having the felt sense of that smile, just filling the chest and heart. The eyes are smiling, the mouth, the heart. And sense a relaxing open so that the shoulders can fall away from the neck. That as you breathe, you can feel the breath and the awareness filling the shoulders and perhaps you're releasing or letting go of any habitual tightness or tension there.

Be aware of the arms, the weight, the volume, the hands. You might soften the hands and soften again. And then feel the hands from the inside out. Aware of how when you relax you can feel more aliveness, more tingling, more vibrating. And again, feeling that open. in the chest and since you can let this next breath be received in a softening belly. This breath and this one and again sense the possibility of continuing with a soft belly. And you might visualize and sense the smile spreading through the belly to help with ease

to help fill your being with well-being. And you might sense the breath receiving deep in the pelvic region. And again, perhaps visualizing and sensing the smile spreading through the pelvic region. A receptivity to life. A smile lets us say yes to the life that's here. The eyes are smiling. The mouth, throat, and the heart, the belly, soft belly, the pelvic region. and sensing the legs, the length, the volume of the legs,

and the feet filled with energy. Feel from the inside out. And if you widen the lens and sense this whole earth and earth body, sensing the energy and the aliveness of the earth flowing up and into you, filling you. So you can feel that you're letting life live through you. this whole tingling, vibrating world, loving the smile, create a vast space that has room for whatever's arising, just resting in this open space of awareness, this openness that's filled

with the light of awareness, this openness that can include the changing sensations, sound, feelings, the movement of the breath. You might notice the mind has drifted, you might notice the attentions in thought in a virtual realm. And that's just a invitation when you see that to gently reopen the attention, listening to the sounds that are right here. Reopen by re-relaxing a bit in the body, noticing if there's something that wants to let go. right now. Sensing the attitude and atmosphere of a smile, that benevolence that says yes to the changing life, moment to moment, sense that you can bring a kindness and an interest, perhaps saying, this belongs and welcoming whatever you notice, a relaxed attentiveness. The poet Mary Oliver writes,

Hello, sun in my face, hello you who make the morning and spread it over the fields and into the faces of the tulips and the nodding morning glories and into the windows of even the miserable and the crotchety. Best preacher that ever was, dear star, that just happens to be where you are in the universe to keep us from ever darkness, to ease us with warm touching, to hold us in the great hands of light, good morning, good morning, good morning. Watch now how I start the day in happiness, in kindness. In these last moments, you might reflect on what you feel grateful for in your life. Just let a few people or activities or experiences come to mind that you're grateful for. Choose one that's

particularly compelling. Remind yourself of it and when it's fully in your mind, just mentally whisper thank you. A thank you from your heart. Then thank you again. Just let it go through you again. And with that, the felt sense of gratitude. Feel how it feels in your body as sensations, as warmth. Let that heart space be as big as it really is. Noticing how the sweetness and tenderness of gratitude, that heart space can really hold the natural passing of all the joys and sorrows.