Tara Brach - Reflection: Cultivating a Loving Heart (2017-08-30)

Episode Date: November 2, 2017

Reflection: Cultivating a Loving Heart (2017-08-30) - Love is an innate capacity, and when we intentionally cultivate it, love shifts from a state to a trait. This meditation offers guidance on how to access love, and open ourselves to it in a way that serves this awakening of our hearts. From the talk: True Resilience – Awakening through All Circumstances – Part 2 "Know that you're rewiring your brain, your heart, your body, your mind - and that the more times you do this, the more you really give it 20 or 30 seconds to feel directly the loving, the more access you have to this very innate capacity in your being." Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

The following reflection is led by Tara Brock. To access more of my meditations or reflections or to join my email list, please visit tarabrock.com. Letting this pause be an invitation to sense what's right here. So just begin with mindfulness because everything we're talking about requires mindfulness. To install a positive experience requires mindfulness. attention to when we're having a good experience, attention to what it feels like. And you might sense more for yourself right now, what is it that you really want to

experience more regularly? Is it peace? Is it gratitude? Is it love? For right now, we'll explore just a deepening and installing more of that sense of loving care. And you might bring to mind an experience with another person, someone that is easy for you to feel love with, to begin with. And bring that person to mind, sense them right here close in, so you can remind yourself of how come you feel loving, with them. You might see the look in their eyes when they're feeling loving towards you, the expression on their face. And you might remind yourself of qualities you love about them,

how they look when they're happy, when they're amused or entertained, they're laughing, are in a really tender place maybe. Reminding yourself of their goodness, basic, intending, to be honest, to be caring. And as you begin to sense in your body, what's the felt experience of loving this person? What's it like? You might mentally whisper the person's name and say thank you. Just to feel, just sense your appreciation and notice how that loving grows in your body, imagining them, receiving your thanks and the connection very alive.

living the feelings of love be as full and strong as they might be. For some it's lovely to put your hand on your heart and just feel that you're just inviting the feelings of love to be as much as they are. You might even mentally whisper the person's name, I love you, and just say their name and say I love you and just imagine them receiving that. letting the feelings be as full as they are and sensing what matters about this loving to you, what makes you value it, how it's relevant to you, sense how it's not always so accessible and just the valuing and just the kind of the wonder of it. Wow, it's just beautiful to have

that tenderness, sensing a freshness and experiencing it. And feeling the loving as if it's possible to let it into your body and your cells even more as if it could just saturate you. Like you're a sponge just filling up with water. Or as if there's a syrup that could just completely fill you. Golden syrup just covering and saturating and filling your being. You can bathe in it. Really letting yourself let it in. Ah, this loving, let it fill me.

If it helps, just to mentally whisper. with a person's name and say, I love you. Just feel it again. Just really light and warmth filling you. And sense what you want to remember about this. Know that you're rewiring your brain, your heart, your body, your mind. And the more times you do this,

the more you really give it 20, 30 seconds, to feel directly the loving, the more access you have to this very innate capacity in your being.