Tara Brach - Reflection: RAIN on Blame (2019-10-16)

Episode Date: October 23, 2019

Reflection: RAIN on Blame - When we are stuck in blame or resentment we are in a trance - the other person becomes an unreal bad other, and our own sense of being contracts into a victimized self, an angry self, a righteous self. This practice guides us in bringing mindfulness and compassion to our inner experience, and then to viewing the other with a more open and clear heart.  By awakening from the trance of blame, we are able to respond with intelligence and care to the unmet needs that underlie all conflict. Join Tara's email community at http://eepurl.com/6YfI, to receive exclusive updates, events, and meditations. - Get a free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease," - plus a bonus gift: "8 Essential Tips to Nourish Your Meditation Practice."

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. Our habit is, whatever we practice really does get stronger, the grooves get deeper. And it takes a really deep reflection and commitment to practice something different. No matter how right you think you are when you're in conflict, no matter how right, it's still a trance that keeps you in a disempowered identity as a separate victimized self. It makes you small and of course it makes the other person small too.

So the invitation here is to deepen our attention in our own lives, each of us, that if each of us right now who's here and who's listening leaned in that direction to wake up out of that trance, to look towards unmet needs, we'd be creating ripples that really can affect consciousness, that open us to a heart space that really can affect consciousness in our world. So I'd like to explore in our meditation now, we're going to do a rain on the world. blame meditation. Take a moment to invite yourself into presence and let your senses be awake, letting go where you can in your body, any tightness or tension, opening to sensations and

aliveness inside you. So we begin the practice of bringing rain to blame by identifying someone you care about and with whom you're experiencing some distance, conflict or tension, not full-blown antagonism. And to help you get in touch, you might bring to mind a particular incident. Remembering the visuals of whatever was going on, the space you were in, the look on the person's face, words exchanged, perhaps the tone. Notice what comes up now.

This is the time to make that you turn and bring your attention from the other to your own inner life. And we begin rain by recognizing whatever is most predominant inside you right now, whatever feelings or reactions could be anger, blame, judgment. And with whatever you're noticing,

A is allow to let it be. Know that this belongs to, this is natural and it belongs. You're not adding any extra judgments about it, not trying to fix it, not ignoring it, just let it be there. This is what will allow you to deepen attention now and the eye is investigate. You might notice what you're believing about yourself and the other. other person. It might be something like, well, if they're acting that way they couldn't care about me or they don't respect me or they don't understand me or I'm not safe with this person. You might notice if there's a belief there and you might notice what's the worst part

of this for you, what's most disturbing or hurtful, what were you really hoping for with this person or wanting that didn't happen? most important, where do you feel the feelings right now in your body? The essence of investigate is to feel in your body where you feel the reaction, the hurt, the anger, the vulnerability. And you might let your face make the expression that expresses what you're feeling in your body and experiment with this. It can be very helpful in getting in touch.

You can even fake it or exaggerate it a little bit with your face and you might even let your posture shift slightly to express how you feel, like how that vulnerability or upset place feels. Maybe your hands go into fists or you hunch over some, just experiment a little. And as you do, go right to where you feel most agitated or vulnerable. your throat, your chest, your belly, and sense what is the unmet need here? What is it your most needing? Is it to feel cared about? To feel respected, important, maybe understood, appreciated, safe?

Sense the unmet need. And now call on the most wise and loving part of your being and you might, if it helps shift your posture and your facial expression and really call on your own high self, that place that's right now witnessing and listening to the vulnerability, the awareness that's here. And see if you can offer to yourself from that high self to the vulnerability exactly what's needed. you might put your hand on your heart as you do so. Sense with that part in you that's got unmet needs, most needs to hear and feel and see if you can offer some message to that part of you that might be comforting, nurturing.

If you've never done this before, let the touch be tender so you can sense that you're offering that tenderness right through your touch to your own heart and if it helps to bring to mind someone that you know loves you and believes in you, a spiritual figure. You can imagine their energy moving through your hand right to the most vulnerable part of you, offering understanding, offering protection, offering care. And notice how as you offer this self-compassion, notice the shift in your own sense of presence. What's changed?

Perhaps that there's less of a sense of a victimized self and there's more presence, more heart. It's from this more awake heart space that you can begin now to look at the other person through wise eyes. Let an image of the other person be there as you imagined them earlier. So you're seeing their face and their body. body posture and imagining their voice and see if you can recognize in them whatever is going on, just whatever you see, anger, upset, distance, shut down, whatever you notice, recognizing their reaction and allow it, let it just be there, give it some space and that can allow you

to begin to investigate, to bring your empathic capacity, deepening your attention. What do you imagine they're feeling? How might they have a leg in a trap where they were hoping for something and not getting it? What might this person's unmet needs be? Did this person need to feel respected, loved, safe? appreciate it. Imagine and sense their vulnerability, maybe as a young person, a vulnerable being and feel

your care, feel your nurturing, your heart space including them. And you might imagine this person feeling their needs met. How might they be or behave or be different if their needs are met? Just imagine that. How would they be if they felt really loved, understood, and safe? As you sense that, you might sense their basic goodness, how the gold shines through when they're not caught in fear. Now take a moment to sense who you are when you're free from blame.

Even just a glimmer of that heart space that can include yourself and others, the realization of true belonging. And you might imagine from this heart space ways you can respond when you next encounter this person with more choice. And we close with a short verse from the poet Mark Nippo. My soul tells me we were all broken from the same nameless heart in every living being, every living thing wakes with a piece of that original heart aching its way into blossom.

This is why we know each other below our strangeness. Why, when we fall, we lift each other, or when in pain we hold each other, why when sudden with joy we dance together. Life is the many pieces of that great heart, loving itself back together. Life is the many pieces of that great heart, loving itself back together. Namaste and thank you for your attention.