Tara Brach - Seeing Beyond the Veil

Episode Date: December 15, 2010

2010-12-15 - The source of our suffering is that we become identified with egoic roles and defenses that separate us from the truth of what we are. This talk explores some of the constricting identities that we take on, and the process of compassionate presence that reconnects us with our natural vitality, openheartedness and wisdom. We then enlarge our focus to seeing past the veil that obscures the sacred presence that shines through all beings. Please support this podcast by donating at www.tarabrach.com or www.imcw.org. Thank you!

I begin tonight with a little story, a Scandinavian story about Princess R and the serpent. And Princess's parents had fallen on hard times, kind of dicey financial kind of problems. And they needed to raise some money, so they went to the Dragon's Horde. And I made an agreement with the Dragon. The Dragon said, sure, I'll give you money. One little small thing in return, your daughter. So you've heard these stories before. They went to the Princess and said, well, dear, we've decided on a proper betroth.

awful and we're getting you married to a dragon and that's what happened but she happened to be a very resourceful young woman so she went although she was frightened and tearful she went to the village wise woman who lived at the edge of the marketplace and found her surrounded by her dozen or two children and grandchildren poured out her story and the wise woman said to her you want to marry this dragon and princess said absolutely not and she said well i have a way i think you can do it that might just work to your benefit. Here's what you have to do on your wedding night, and then she kind of whispered into her ear a few things,

and she basically said the first thing you have to do is get a number of wedding gowns, 10, in fact. So the wedding came, all the people came to the court, there was a big celebration, it was a little tough, but they retired, went to the bridal chambers, and the dragon turned to the princess and said, well, isn't it time to consummate our wedding? The princess responded, yes, my dear husband, but for me to do so, I must remove my wedding gowns. Is that not so?

Absolutely, my dear, joyfully. She said, okay, I have a small favor to ask you in return. Since I must remove my gowns to be pleasing to you, would you not remove a layer of your own so you could be pleasing to me? And, yeah, so she took off a wedding gown, and he had a few decorative things on his dragon body. He took them off. Okay, fine. To a surprise, you notice that she had another wedding gown on. Second of ten. She took that one off. Dragons are used to taking off their scales. They're like reptiles. They have to shed some once in a while. So he peeled off a thin layer. Yes, dear, of course. Oops. She had another gown on. So he's kind of having to take off a little more. She's got three, four, five, six gowns. The dragon's claws had to dig deeper and deeper into his own flesh and skin to peel off yet another layer. And then on the eighth wedding gown she took off, the dragon was down to taking off parts of himself that were stuck. And a swarm began to change. And on the ninth, it changed more remarkably. And when she took off the tenth gown,

by that time the dragon had pulled off so much dragoness that what was left, as is often true in such stories, was a handsome prince. Do you guys know this story? So then she took the advice of the old woman from the marketplace and she had it that had a dozen children, a dozen grandchildren, and continued a night of wedded bliss. So I share this story because the practice of meditation can feel very much like this,

that there's layers of our being that are opening, kind of hour by hour that as we open, what's revealed is an underlying beauty, is a lucidity, a clarity of mind, an openness of heart. One of the classic metaphors that describes our predicament is that when we're stuck, we're looking through a veil of illusion. And what that veil is, the big illusion, is that our coverings, You know, what we all have. We all have coverings to protect us and defend us.

And the illusion is that the coverings are who we are. This is the big illusion that's at the center of all suffering. That what we might call the layers of our ego, that we take on because we're afraid or are confused. You know, the persona, the mask. the big illusion that causes us suffering is that we think that's who we are. You know, we forget that that luminosity that's really the awakeness, the openness, the tenderness of who we are. We forget. So this is the form of our suffering,

this kind of getting identified with the scales. And just to say that some Some of the layering, it's not that there's something wrong with having an ego or having layering. I mean, it's just part of our kind of design. It's just that there's suffering if we mistake the ego and the layering to be who we are. There's more. So the purpose of the spiritual path is actually very, very simple. It's to recognize that way we get identified, how we get hitched to the scales, to the coverings. And in that recognizing, there's a loosening.

It's not like we have to tear off anything, really. That's where the story is not quite a match. It's not like we're ripping off parts of ourselves. We're just seeing the parts and realizing, oh, these are the waves of what's going on, but there's an ocean here. There's a beingness that's here. We come home to that.

So tonight what I'd like to explore is how to see past the veil, how to see past the coverings. How to see past that in ourselves. Because every one of us, if you feel that you in your life have some level of getting stuck, some level of getting caught in a trance, that's because you're believing you are the scales. So seeing past that veil. And seeing past it with each other.

So often we look at each other and all we see is the covering. Okay, so that's a bit of what we'll explore tonight. The Buddha's basic teaching is that whenever we react, when there's pleasantness and we start grabbing after it or there's unpleasantness and we're pushing away, that's when we start getting identified. We become a wanting self or a fearing self. So much of this path is this basic understanding

that it's not what's happening in your life right now that's causing trouble. I don't care what it is. Whether it's a serious illness or a real painful trouble with custody kind of an agreement or deep, deep breakup with somebody or a loneliness you're afraid will never end, I don't care what it is. I mean, I care, but that's not what's causing you suffering. What's causing suffering is how you're relating to it.

Are you identified with the coverings? So what are some of the core identities that we get identified with? Because if we can see them in action, truly seeing is freeing. And the more deeply we see them, the more we really pause and see them, the less we're hooked. So what are they? Okay, so just as you listen, I'll just name some and just sense what resonates for you in your life. And one of the biggest identities we get caught up in is the controller. We have an idea of the self

as the one that's supposed to be deciding and directing and maneuvering and sometimes the controller feels competent where the boss we're in charge. Sometimes the controller feels incompetent. Things aren't going our way. But there's a lot of reliance on figuring out and the controller does

not like ambiguity. The controller does not like not knowing how things are going. This is Garfield cartoon, he says, as a cat, I love to explore the unknown. So he looks over his shoulder. Nothing behind me. Then look of satisfaction. That's enough exploring for one day. So it's kind of like that, that, you know, we're not comfortable with not being on top. Now closely related to the controllers, the doer, and most of us probably really relate to this one. We're the one that's supposed to

to get things done that wants to get things done and our value is hitched to what we're doing. Okay? And our lack of value is hitched to it too. What's not being done. So it's got a lot to do with accomplishment. And even the meditation can be the doer does meditation and tries to have certain things happen through meditation. You ever sense that behind meditation there's this curtain and you're behind there kind of

trying to maneuver your way to something? And it's very much a part of our culture. Just online today, I saw one thing that said, newest weight loss strategy, meditate before eating your meals. I think if we could do that, if we could remember to meditate before we ate our meals at all,

even like a minute, of course everything would change, but we don't. And then again online, sexual meditation, overcome your sexual dysfunction and impotency. impotency, impotency to, everything. You know, do you get what I'm saying, though? That we're trying to use meditation to certain ends.

We're trying to control the meditation. We're trying to control our experience. And then, of course, we try to control other people around us by being the doer. And then the opposite side, the victim, the one who is being done, the one whose things are happening to. How many moments do you go through the day thinking in some way bad things are happening to you? Does that resonate that one? the victim? For me, if I just hear the word

Blue Cross, my victim self incarnates, really, it's amazing. As soon as I think of insurance, it's like I become this victim immediately. So there's a sense of the victim that life, others are taking advantage of us, that we're being mistreated. Once woman leaves a retreat and she has to go to,

she's taking a flight and she has to switch planes, she buys at you know she's waiting in the airport she buys a cup of coffee and a small package of cookies and she goes to an unoccupied table and somebody she bends aware of some somebody rustling at her table and behind she looks because she's reading the paper she puts down her paper and she sees this neatly dressed young man helping himself to her cookies she doesn't want to make a scene so she leans across and takes a cookie herself a minute or so passes more rustling he's helping himself to another cookie. We're talking about victim here, right?

So by the time they're down to the last cookie in the package, she's very angry but still can't bring herself to saying anything. And then the young man breaks the cookie in two, pushes half across to her, eats the other half, and leaves. Sometime later when the public address system calls for her to present her ticket, she's still fuming. How could he?

Imagine her embarrassment when she opens her handbag and is confronted by her package of cookies. She had been eating his. So victim. Okay, another very common identity is the judge. I am the judge. I am the one who sees how other people are falling short. And then there's another one which is the performer.

Now, the performer's the one who tries to impress other people, tries to get other people's respect or approval. It's trying to be right, trying to be funny, trying to pass the task. Most moments with other people, there's some of the performer going on, some part of us that is behaving in a way to elicit a certain response. That's the performer. The performer was trained early on because how early was it that we got gold stars for behaving a certain way? We got a certain response we're looking for. And one story,

some children that were asked by teacher, the question, named six animals which live specifically in the Arctic. and one child wrote down two polar bears, three, and he crossed off the three, four seals. He got it, six. Another question, what was Sir Walter Raleigh famous for? He's a noted figure in history because he invented cigarettes and started a craze for bicycles. Another question, what happens during puberty to a boy? He says goodbye to his childhood and enters adultery. I'll do one more I'll tell you what is a vibration well there are good vibrations and bad

vibrations good vibrations were discovered in the 1960s so the performer and then our identity gets invested in particular roles for some of us that we take on that really matter a lot to us whether it's boss or employee or teacher our student our son or rebel and one of the big ones is parent you know when we get get invested in parent and identified then we can very easily get dig in our heels and feel offended when our authority's not respected or freaked out when our child isn't being who we think they should be florida scott maxwell quips no matter how old a mother is she watches her middle-aged children for signs of improvement and then you have two women on a park bench and one says oi the other reply oi and the first says okay enough about the children so I'm just giving you a sense okay so we get identified as parent and then we get certain other affiliations like I'm a Jew or a Baptist

or a Buddhist I'm gay I'm Republican I'm an environmentalist whatever it is but there's an identification there so as I mentioned it's not necessarily a problem like any of the scales or coverings, we put them on and we move through the day and we do our thing. The suffering is if we've got an exclusive identification that then separates, really separates us from our wholeness of being. I mean, that's the pain of it. Because whenever we're exclusively identified in our role with those scales, there's a wanting and a fearing self there. there's in some way we're caught in something smaller

than the truth of who we are and when we're most stressed that's when we get most identified with our coverings that's when we get most identified so I noticed I've kind of

as I prepare to do a talk I kind of watch myself and I was just investigating for myself roles and where I was getting caught and just noticed approaching the holidays. I have extended family. Everybody's coming into town.

I'm doing a lot of the hosting. And I found the role that I've most gotten into is this kind of over-responsible, what sometimes called the hero child, the one that's the offspring, but that's now taking on a lot or taking on a whole lot. And I realized in some way my psyche was

if anybody in this gathering is at all unhappy, in any way feels let down by the Christmas gathering, moi, I'm at fault. That was the belief underneath. And I mean, how many of us have something? Can I see how many of you have something like that going on? Just so I'm, okay, good. I'm in good company.

So it's that kind of a thing that without noticing it, I was feeling, you know, that tension of that role. And it reminded me of a friend that I had spoken with. Several months ago, she called me and wanted to bounce something around, which was really a painful situation. What was going on for her, she was very worried about her grandchildren, especially the older grandchild, a six-year-old, who is increasingly becoming insecure and very grasping,

but in a way that was really anxious and scared a lot. And her daughter and her son-in-law keep moving from place to place. And so this six-year-old keeps getting pulled out of whatever school she's in. So there's a lot of instability. Too many babysitters, both parents work. The son-in-law drinks too much. So this friend of mine was trying to talk to her daughter, but every time she would try to bring it up and say,

look, you know, especially your oldest daughter, you know, she's having trouble. Her daughter would shut down and started pushing her way actually, you know, real angry. And she got angry back. And she realized what she was locking into was the role of this angry, pushy warrior kind of person. And she was a warrior on behalf of what she felt like was her neglected grandchild. But as any of you know, if you're a grandparent, you can't do anything. And not only that, she was really kind of hating herself for her own pushiness and her own kind of aggressiveness about it, but she was freaked out. So we just started exploring it. And as you know, if you've been coming here before, we, the basic practice of mindfulness, just to recognize and allow what's here, just pause with it.

So that's what she did. She began to pause with it and kind of then investigate that kind of place that felt so pushy and so compelled to try to do something. And as you might imagine, the layer underneath that pushiness and that aggressiveness was real fear. You know, my daughter's life is going to be injured in some way. You know, she's really, she's going to have injury to her psyche. She'll have an unhappy life. And then she got a touch with the powerlessness of maybe that could happen and I can't do anything. And then underneath that sorrow, just a feeling of sadness that things, here's this young person that she absolutely adored and just just the sadness that she was having a hard time. And so she just

kept staying with that and there was just an intense vulnerability. And then she was able to feel compassion towards herself. Okay, I'm scared for someone I love. Compassion, compassion. There's caring here. And then I asked a question I often asked, which is, who would you be if you weren't identified with that particular covering of the pushy grandmother? Who would you be? And what she, you know, if you weren't identified with the controller, the one that really was trying to control was happening. And it was really, for her I could almost see you know the sensing that change in her she said well if I couldn't be identified with the controller if I could kind of see past that one

then there would be a sense of a kind of tenderness and creativity those were the words if I couldn't control there would just be this like there would be more spontaneity I would just respond but there'd be a lot of tenderness because I'm scared that's what she came up with just this kind of spontaneity and tenderness, but she said, I'd be more receptive. Okay. This is the inner training when we start identifying

what role we're caught in. When I was reflecting on that, I did the same thing with myself. Okay, so what if I wasn't the hero child? What if I wasn't the over-responsible controller this holiday season? And you're getting a very up-to-the-minute process that I went through.

And I started imagining each relationship with each person, okay, I'm not in charge of this person's happiness and satisfaction. And all of a sudden, it went from this rigid tense thing to this kind of flow where I had no idea what would happen. But there was a tremendous openness. It was like this adventure. Like I could enter into the holidays with this sense of the mystery because I wasn't in charge. of making it happen in a certain way. Does that make sense? Yeah.

So just to say that it takes many, many rounds when we have a kind of hardened identity and most of us have been playing out our doer, our controller, our judge, or our victim, we've been playing it out and developed a total mastery

at that role. So it takes many rounds of pausing and saying, oh, okay. So what selfing? What have they collected around, hardened around? And then it takes a lot of compassion because there's usually fear. There's usually some fear under there that's really difficult to be where. Just to say that it's not like we're going to war against our ego identities. That would actually be another ego identity, the warrior that's trying to get rid of our ego identities. Okay? What's behind this inquiry into the scales that we've identified with is this caring about being really fully alive, about living from a wholeness? Like if I enter the holidays and I'm playing the hero child, I miss out and others miss out

because I'm playing from this old controlling rigid identity. So it's not a like I'm trying to get rid of something. It's that I care about living more from the truth of who I am. The same process that I've just described internally goes on interpersonally because usually what happens with any two people is there's an interpersonal dance that's really a dance of two hardened ego identities. And so if we are in that with each other, it's the same thing. Can we pause and look and see, oh, what have I collected around? This is Robert Johnson. He says, the night before their marriage, they held a ritual where they made their shadow vows. The groom said, I will give you an identity and make the world see you as an extension of myself. The bride replied, I will be compliant and sweet,

but underneath I will have the real control. If anything goes wrong, I'll take your money in your house. They then drank champagne and laughed heartily at their foible. knowing that in the course of the marriage, these shadow figures would inevitably come out. They were ahead of the game because they had recognized the shadow and unmasked it. So this is the invitation to begin to recognize, well, what are the coverings or the veil? What's the veil that I'm of illusion? Where am I taking myself to be something smaller? Am I buying into the victim? whether it's with the world or in a particular relationship

or buying into I'm the judge, I'm the right one. Or as I've been talking about, the controller. So back to this friend of mine, she had kind of unmasked in a way the pushy, controlling grandmother role she was in and got to the vulnerable place. And in her relationship with her daughter, because this is really an interpersonal dance,

her daughter had shut down and become the, you know, putting up the guard, pushing away person. So she backed off with her daughter. And when her daughter did call her, I think it was, you know, Thanksgiving was coming up or something. They talked, but before that she had been able to really reflect and sense, you know, once you've looked behind your own mask, you can then look at another and say, well, what's really happening? and she did that with her daughter and she could see behind the distancing and the shutting down

that her daughter felt threatened and felt guilty about what was going on and probably felt caught between her, this mother and her husband, which often happens, that kind of triangulation and that she cared. She was confused and that she cared and she was worried.

This is what she saw. So when they did talk because her daughter did call her, this friend of mine apologized and she was very real she admitted that she was coming out of a fearful place and that she was scared and that she was powerless but she cared

and she did it without blaming she just said I'm just scared it's just hard but no blaming the next day her daughter called her and at that point because she had been vulnerable her daughter was able to be vulnerable and say just how difficult it was and scary it was to see her daughter so upset all the time and how she didn't really

know what to do. And this woman, the mom, just listened. She didn't then say, well, here's what I think you should do. Just listened. So I'm not going to continue on that relationship, but just to say they both were able to see past the veil to step out of their roles, but it takes some real deliberateness. Poet Mark Nippo in his book of awakening writes we waste so much energy trying to cover up who we are

when beneath every attitude is the want to be loved and beneath every anger is a wound to be healed and beneath every sadness is the fear that there will not be enough time. Our challenge each day

is not to get dressed to face the world, but to un-glove ourselves so that the doorknob feels cold, and the car handle feels wet, and the kiss goodbye feels like the lips of another being soft and unrepeatable. The less we're identified with these scales, with the hardened ego coverings, the more we can be touched by life. And the sad thing is, when we're so busy being the doing, the doing. or are the controller, are the victim. We can't really let life touch us.

We're occupied. We're not available. So thus far, I've really been describing how we can see behind the veil, sense our own ego identities, the roles or the scales that we get caught identified with, see others a bit. But I've been talking about others that we know,

and I want to share with you, you know, what do we see as we move through the world, those that we don't know? How are we moving through the world? And I share with you a story I heard on a Christmas Eve now, a number of years ago, five, six, seven years ago that was shared by a Unitarian minister. I was at a Unitarian church with my family. And we also with some friends who had their son, who was a, this young man, had some disability. and he sat next to me at church.

And I want to share with you the story that we heard. And I share it probably once a year because it teaches me every time. So if you've heard it before, I hope you'll feel the same way. It was Sunday Christmas, our family, it spent the holidays in San Francisco with my husband's parents.

And we had a drive back to Los Angeles, a long drive, 400 miles. Normally an eight-hour drive, but with the kids, it can be a 14-hour end-door. endurance test. So when we could stand it no longer, we stopped for lunch in King City, this little metropolis made up of six gas stations and three diners. We went into one of those, the four of us. And as I sat, Eric, our one-year-old, in a high chair, I looked around and wondered, what am I doing

in this place? The restaurant was nearly empty. We were the only family, the only ones with children. And everyone was kind of eating and talking quietly. My reverie was interrupted when I heard Eric squeal with glee, hi there. Two words he thought were one. Hi there. He pounded his fat baby hands, whack, whack on the metal high chair tray. His face was alive with excitement, eyes wide, gums bared and a toothless grin. He wriggled and chirped and giggled and then I saw the source of his merriment and my eyes could not take it in all at once. A tattered rag of a coat obviously bought by someone else eons ago, dirty, greasy worn, baggy pants, both they and the zes. zipper at half-masked, toes that poked out of woodby shoes, a shirt that had ring around the

collar, face like none other, gums as bare as Eric's, hair uncombed, unwashed, whiskers too short to be called a beard, but way, way beyond a shadow, and a nose, so vericose, it looked like a map of New York. I was too far away to smell him, but I knew he smelled, and his hands were waving in the air, flapping about on loose wrists. Hi there, baby boy, hi, big, boy, I see a buster. My husband and I exchanged a look that was across between, What do we do, and poor devil. Eric continued to laugh and answer,

Hi there, every call was echoed. I noticed waitresses' eyebrows shoot to their foreheads and several people sitting near us out loud. This old geezer was creating a nuisance with my beautiful baby. I shoved a cracker at Eric and he pulverized it on the tray. I whispered why me under my breath. Our meal came and the nuisance continued. Now the old bum was shouting from across the room.

Do you know Patty Cake? Adaboy, you know peekaboo? Hey, look, he knows peekaboo. Nobody thought it was cute. The guy was probably a drunk and a definite disturbance. I was embarrassed. My husband Dennis was humiliated. Even our six-year-old said,

why is that old man talking so loud? We ate in silence, except Eric, who is running through his repertoire for the admiring applause of a Skid Row bum. Finally, I had enough. I turned the high chair. Eric screamed and clamored around to face his old buddy. Now I was really mad.

Dennis went to pay the check imploring me to get Eric and meet me in the parking lot. I trundled Eric out of the high chair and looked toward the exit. The old man sat poised and waiting, his chair directly between me and the door. Lord, just let me get out of here before he speaks to me or Eric. I headed toward the door. it soon became apparent to both the Lord and Eric had other plans as I drew closer to the man

I turned my backs walking to sidestep him in any air he might be breathing as I did so Eric all the while with his eyes riveted to his best friend leaned far over my arm reaching with both arms in a baby's pick-me-up position

in a split second of balancing my baby and turning to counter his weight I came eye to eye with the old man Eric was lunging for him eyes spread wide. The bum's eyes both asked and implored, Would you let me hold your baby? There was no need for me to answer since Eric propelled himself from my arms to the man's. Suddenly a very old man and a very young baby were involved in a love relationship. Eric laid his tiny head upon the man's ragged

shoulder. The man's eyes closed and I saw tears hover beneath his lashes. His aged hands full of grime and pain and hard labor. Gently, so gently, cradled my baby's bottom and stroke his back. I stood awestruck. The old man rocked and cradled Eric in his arms for a moment and then his eyes open and set squarely on mine. He said in a firm, commanding voice,

you take care of this baby. Somehow I managed, I will, from a throat that contained a stone. He pried Eric from his chest, unwillingly, longingly, as though he were in pain. I held my arms open to receive my baby, and again the gentleman addressed me. God bless you, ma'am, you've given me my Christmas gift. I said nothing more than a muttered thanks.

With air back of my arms, I ran for the car. Dennis wondered why I was crying and holding Eric so tightly and why I was saying, my God, my God, forgive me. after hearing the story when I was in this church the young man next to me was weeping of course I was crying too there was a sense that he

he was living with how many people had not seen him and I was living with how many times if I failed to see the humanity and whoever I'm with the spirit and how many times have I felt unseen too

I mean it's like we all live it from both sides the sadness and the possibility have to do with seeing past the veil. It's the thing that if we commit ourselves to can free us and free anyone we're with, really heal anyone we're with, in the moments that we really look to see who's here. And know that everyone has coverings. I mean, we've, it's part of our conditioning in the deepest way, and it's our culture. We have coverings and there's fear in them and there's grasping in them. And there's suffering behind them.

And if we can't look at each other and say, okay, so there's those coverings and there's behind those eyes looking out the same awareness that's looking out through these eyes. and there's in that heart the same tenderness. If we can do that, that begins to create the possibility truly of a loving world. So I began with the dragon story. You know, we're not trying to peel off our layers and we're not trying to change other people

to get them to peel off theirs. There's just this real awake, kind recognition that these layers happen and they're not who we are, that we can start seeing the radiance. that's shining through ourselves and other people. What it takes, it's a life practice

to see who's really here. But what it takes is a lot of compassion because our tendency is to react to the dragonness with aversion, our own and others. This is Barbara Kingsolver. She says,

here's what I've decided. The very least you can do in your life, is figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is live inside that hope. Not admire it from a distance, but live right in it, under its roof. What I want is so simple,

I almost can't say it. Elementary kindness. What I want is so simple, I almost can't say it. Elementary kindness. Having the intention as we leave here and as we enter our next day or next year,

whatever it is we're entering, to bring this kind attention to see who we are and to see each other through these eyes is really the gift that we can bring to our lives. So I'd like to close tonight

with a simple reflection that's on this theme in the same spirit. So if you will, do whatever you need to sit, for these last few minutes, it won't be a long reflection. So in this pause of arriving,

just invite yourself into the moment. See if you can relax a little in your body, just let go wherever possible. And just feel the life breath, the inflow and outflow as a way of collecting your attention so you know you're here. And you might scan a bit right now from this place of presence.

of presence, just in a mindful way, just scan the landscape of your life and sense where you find you get into a, it's a pattern of where you get into some reactivity that really comes from this ego identity, where you've collected around an identity. And you might find that wherever the place of reactivity and suffering is, the identity is one of the doer that maybe feels like you're not being competent or capable, kind of a failing self. Or maybe it's the controller that then is distanced from others.

Or maybe the suffering is when you're in the role of victim and you feel that others have taken advantage of you or not attended to you in some way. Or maybe it's the judge. So you might just take some moments to sense where you get confined, get identified. As you're reflecting, I'll just name a few others. Maybe you get identified as the helper.

And then find that you're not taking care of your own life. Or the patient, the designated patient, or the aggressor. Or maybe you're the pursuer. or you're the rejecter. Sometimes it's hard to bring up situations on command. So just take your time and you might not find something. You might just feel a certain energy in your body right now

that feels where you feel stuck in wanting or fearing. With whatever you've noticed, take some moments just to pause and sense the beginning of rain, which is recognizing and allowing it. Just let it be there. if you see the controller or the judge or the victim just say okay it's as if you're bowing to what is you're saying okay so these are the scales or the layers or the covers that are covering that where there's some identification okay just let it be there

that's the beginning of kindness just let it be there it's not your fault this is just the way we're designed to get identified you can begin to investigate and so sense when you're in that role, what are you believing? What's the belief that's most deep that you can find? Is it that something needs to change for you to be okay or that something's wrong with you or something's wrong with another? What's the fear? What's the deepest fear that's underneath that role, that identity? And as you sense into that, again, kindness, if it helps you to put your hand on your heart to really deeply bring a kind attention. For many of us, it's very, very helpful to let there be a light, a tender touch to the heart, so that you're

really bringing a gentle compassion to the fear that's underneath the role that you're noticing. All of our ego identities are driven by some form of insecurity, just recognizing this with a kind presence is the beginning of freedom. The Buddha said, I see you Mara when the forces of the shadow side would appear. Just I see you. Come to tea. I'll be with you. There's not a war here. There's just sensing the place where there's identification, the controller, the aggressive one, the victim. I see you. It's okay. As you offer this kind presence, you might even ask yourself, who would I be if I wasn't identified with this role? What would my life be like?

If I wasn't defending or protecting or judging? Can you get a glimpse of the freedom when you're not identified with the scales, with the coverings? Of the creativity that's possible. Of the spontaneity that's possible if you're not controlling things. of the love that can flow when you're not in a reaction. Just noticing what's going on inside you right now, whatever it is, whatever the feelings are, the thoughts,

to hold with a very kind presence. And you might sense who's aware right now of all of this, of this whole meditation, who's really listening and feeling, what's happening. Can you sense the awareness, the presence that's aware of the patterns, that's aware of the identification? You sense the awareness that's peering through the mask. If your reflection included another person, if you were in reaction to another person, you might sense who's looking through that person's mask, who's behind that person's reactivity,

that wants to love and be loved, with the natural fear that surrounds and armors so many of us. What brings us to meditate, what brings us to begin to look at our places of identification, is this care about waking up, about living from loving presence, from the essence of what we are, from the wholeness of our being. So we close tonight in that spirit with the loving kindness meditation. Very simple offering of blessings inward. Just to sense where you are right this moment, what is the wish you most want to offer to yourself?

Right here, right now. What do you want to offer to your own heart? And just mentally whisper your wish inward. and bringing to mind one person you'd like to offer your healing prayer to, one person in your life that you'd like to just bring into the room, feel his or her presence right here, close in, sensing the coverings, these kind of scales or layers that we've been talking about tonight, the kind of ways the persona or personality gets stuck,

and the vulnerability that's underneath that always. And sensing the inherent goodness of that person who's really looking through those eyes, that spirit, that light, that love, just sensing that being who's really there and offering your wish, your prayer to that being for their well-being. Feeling the heart that's offering care as edgeless,

this very heart as vast, as wide as the world, so that you can sense that you're holding the earth our mother in your lap and all beings in your heart all that are here in this room are in your heart friends family those you don't know

all species of creatures that fly and swim run on the ground this earth our mother is in your lap and all beings are in your heart so that we offer our prayer together tonight that all beings everywhere

might trust their very essence as loving presence, realize and trust their essence as loving presence, that all beings might touch great and natural peace. May there be peace on earth. May there be peace on earth. May there be peace on earth and everywhere. May all beings awaken and be free. Namaste. The talk you just listened to has been freely offered.

If you'd like to make a donation, learn more about my schedule, or about programs offered by the Insight Meditation Community of Washington, please visit either my website, which is tarabrock.com, our IMCW site, which is IMCW.org. Thank you very much.