Tara Brach - The Two Wings of Awareness (2015-05-27)

Episode Date: May 29, 2015

The Two Wings of Awareness (2015-05-27) - The two wings of understanding and love awaken as we learn to recognize what is here in the present moment, and to allow experience to be just as it is. This talk includes a guided reflection and a brief period of questions and responses.

The following talk is given by Tara Brock, meditation teacher, psychologist, and author. What I'd like to do in this talk is explore a bit of kind of the essence of our meditation practice, what's sometimes called as the two wings of meditation. And as many of you know, because meditations become so mainstream at this point, there's a distinctive Western imprint on it. And this is an example, this ad I found a couple of years ago, it says, you know, the question is, why don't people meditate given all the benefits?

And then the response is, well, it just takes too much time. But what would you say if we told you that with just a press of a button, you could have access to the same deep, highly pleasurable, extremely beneficial meditation states as those with decades, of experience. And you'd get the same results in much, much less time plus a host of other life-enhancing benefits. Well, thanks to these CDs, you can achieve precisely the same electrical brainwave patterns

of profoundly deep meditation, safely, simply and effortlessly. A few minutes of your days, all you need to transform your life. That's Western, right? Some of you know I, one of my first places I went to study meditation was the Insight Meditation Society up in Barry, Massachusetts, called IMS. And one of the letters that they got addressed to them was addressed to the instant meditation society. I thought that was appropriate.

So the inquiry will be for our exploration tonight and as I mentioned, we'll open it to your questions. is really what in this moment most serves awakening. What in this moment will most help me get back to a sense of peace or presence or freedom? You can put the word in. But what really serves in this moment? And you might ask yourself that, like what a you sense helps you in this moment? come home, come home to a quality of presence that you value.

So that's going to be the inquiry and I'll ask you to check that out again. The presumption is that we spend many moments in a kind of trance where we're separated from that quality of presence. So it takes intention to come back again. And we're often a dream that the Buddha talked about it more as a dream. We're kind of on automatic. And when we're on automatic, it's that some of you remember from James Joyce that line, Mr. Duffy lived a short distance from his body.

Remember that one? Well, it's, we're not quite here. We're often a kind of incessant inner dialogue that's taking place a little bit outside ourselves. So that kind of characterizes the trance we're in. We're in a movie and the movie is starring Mois. You know, we're each in our little home movie and we're at the center of it and the themes have to do with, you know, what am I worrying about right now or what do I need to have happen, what can go wrong, you know, what will help me get more comfortable.

You know, we're kind of in that type of an inner movie. And when we're in that, and the more stressed we are, the more others are unreal others. They're kind of way out there. And when they're unreal others, either they're associated with something we want, you know, we're wanting their time or attention, or something we don't want, we don't want their interference or their judgment. Are they're not pleasant or unpleasant, in which case they're not really relevant, so we don't pay much attention. This is again a characteristic of the trance we're in.

Probably the most painful characteristic of living in these stories about our life that are starring Mois is that the main protagonist, ourself, isn't a very well-respected character in our own minds, which by saying that I mean that we generally don't treat ourselves as our own best friend or an honored being. Rather, there's a sense of a kind of chronic, sometimes conscious, not always though, sense of I'm not doing so well. I'm falling short. I need to be better in some way. Something is wrong with me. That's the kind of state of mind. And we're continuously monitoring how we're doing. So by that I mean there's something in the background right now in my brain,

this is, I'm reporting it for real, that's kind of evaluating, well how am I right now? Am I feeling authentic? You know, am I in my body? Am I kind of calibrating to who's here and attuned? You know, there's that inner monitoring. And typically, for most of us, our evaluation and our sense of how we should be are different. There's a gap. And that gap, we're not always conscious of it, but it weighs us down. It makes us feel like something's not quite right. Does this resonate? Okay. So we have this inner monitor, this kind of self-consciousness that's kind of sensing not only how we're doing but how we should, be. And it's been internalized. We got messages that taught us the standards.

When I talk about this, it often reminds me of a story heard years ago about children in a Catholic school cafeteria. And at the beginning of the line, there's a pile of cookies and there's a sign that says, take just one. God is watching. Okay? At the end of the line, a heap of apples and a child has written a sign and says, take all you want, God's watching the cookies. When we come together on this path, the teachings and the practices are all meant to help us wake up out of that trance. So we move from the stories that are moving through our brain, you know, from being kind of in a virtual reality to noticing that and coming back and being in our bodies and being in our hearts and being in relationship with our world in a way that

is open and loving. That's the waking up from the trance. So what we're really doing is waking up from a very narrow sense of identity. Because when you're in a very narrow sense of identity, When you're in a trance, you're believing in a limited sense of who you are. You're believing in a self that is defective in certain ways and should be doing certain things and needs to meet certain expectations. And as I've shared with many of you, one of the, a palliative caregiver who had been with thousands and thousands of people described the... deepest regret that people when they're dying expressed and it was that I didn't

live true to myself. You know, that I lived according to expectations, according to, you know, self-imposed judgments and shoulds, but I didn't live true to myself. Which is another way of saying I was living inside a trance. So we wouldn't be here and we wouldn't be exploring these practices unless there was a certain amount of awareness that, yes, I'm living inside something that's less than the fullness of who I can be. We realize that and that kind of draws us to practice. We intuit that identity that we stay in, that story of ourselves, is less than the truth of who we are.

And there's a longing. There's a longing in each of us to love without holding back. And there's a longing in each of us to be with each other and really come forward in presence and not be kind of caught up and distracted or judging. There's a longing in us to be more spontaneous, not to have to keep on going along and rerunning the same routines of defensiveness or aggressive. aggressiveness. We have these longings. So the practices are to wake us up out of that small sense of self and reconnect us with... I like the way Emerson put it. He described it as

the soul of the whole, you know? The soul of the whole is the intelligence and love that flows through us when we're awake. It's a beautiful way. describe it. So we practice and we'll look at right now the most basic components of our practice. Talk a little bit of more about how we develop them and then I'll open it to your questions. And one of my favorite ways of presenting the practice is through a story that's been, it's kind of a mythic story of in India, a Buddhist monk who lived in the north of India, who's known as a brother of mercy, he was a healer and his way of working with people was to hold this huge space of compassion. So anyone that came and studied with him would almost energetically

kind of get a transmission of kindness, how to be kind to themselves and others. And that was his primary teaching. But he had kind of an experience of burnout where he just had been with people a lot and holding this space but he felt burned and weary and like something wasn't alive and what he was doing. So he went on a pilgrimage and he walked and he was this three weeks of walking where he was going to go see a very, very well-known nun who lived in the south of India, a Buddhist nun who was known for a much more directive style that sought clarity and understanding. And this nun was known for really inquiry, you know, really looking into what's real, what's true. So he went on this pilgrimage

to find her and had a need for her wisdom and her healing. And he walked about halfway, you know, in his journey and he was staying over at a temple. And at that temple, he encountered an old nun and he told her of what his plans were. He told her of his journey and a search for wisdom and inspiration. And she offered to guide him to the residents. of this famous person. And so they went together and they arrived at the edge of a bustling kind of a village

and they're warmly received and it turns out that the old nun guiding him was none other than the great master he was seeking. And over the year she taught him a lot about how to empower others using these practices of recognition and clarity and inquiry and mindfulness, teaching him, you know,

how do people discover the nature of reality? And so he learned a lot from her, cultivated a lot of understanding and so on. Well, many years later, as she lay dying, the old nun beckoned the monk to her side. And she said, you know, there's something I never told you. And on that day that we met, I too had lost heart.

She said, I was heading north seeking a great healer I had heard about. And she smiled and squeezed his hand and peacefully passed away. So you understand that they both had elements of what the other needed. That he was teaching the path of compassion of heart, of really holding that space of allowing and acceptance and tenderness. it, he needed some more of that inquiry, that what is this? What is the nature of reality? And she was really inquiring and directive and so it's much more engaged, but she was looking for more of that tender quality. And so it is with each of us in our practice that these

are the two wings. Okay? This is the wing of understanding that's really looking to see what is true. And if you close your eyes for a moment and check out the wing of understanding, just for a moment right now, the inquiry is quite simple. It's what is happening inside me right now? What is happening inside me right now? And just notice how that inquiry directs the attention with some interest to the life of the moment. The second wing has the question, and can I be with this? Can I let this be? And ask that question, can I be with this or can I let this be?

And notice how that question can connect you with a sense of space and allowing acceptance. So these are the two wings of the bird and clearly in order to fly and be free, we need both qualities of understanding and love. It's interesting to me that in the Asian scripts, the words for heart and mind are the same. Pali, Chita, heart mind, which basically goes to say that you really can't separate. If there's true understanding, there has to be a tender openness. And if there's truly a tender openness, there has to be a quality of presence that knows. So they go together, they're inextricable, and in your practice, as you unfold on the path,

it's quite skillful to be emphasizing one or the other at different times. There are times when we'll find it's really, really valuable to put more emphasis on inquiry and noticing what's going on and contacting the moment. Okay? And at other times we really need to cultivate our hearts. We need to soften. We need to say, it's okay, sweetheart. We need to put our hands on our heart. Because if our heart's not soft, we're not going to notice what's here in the moment. We're going to be too judgmental. Okay? So they go together. They go together in a deep way. And just to give you a sense, I mean, this, sometimes I call it recognizing

and allowing, that this is the very heart of a mindfulness practice. Notice. what's happening and allowing it. So I'll give you an example of two different examples. First my own is this morning's meditation, how it went this morning, just using these two wings that I'm describing. And my practices in the morning that I go out right away and go walking and maybe it's the whole walk is it takes about 40, an hour and a half, but I'll walk for about 45 minutes, and then I stop at this stream that it's part of a stream that flows into the Potomac. And I have a spot that I really like, and I'll meditate there. My dog's amazing. She just kind of plunks down and she meditates with me.

And I usually end my meditation when she's done. So she calls it. So this morning I was by the stream, and the stream is full enough most of the time that you get the sounds of water flowing over rocks. It's quite lovely. And this morning, not only that, there was a wood thrush that had set up camp right near me. And if you know the song of the wood thrush, it's about as beautiful as a bird song comes. So I was getting this symphony of water sounds and wood thrush, plus the temperature at that time in the morning was just perfect. And so I was in this, oh, life is kind of perfect mode,

recognizing the perfectness and allowing it and all that. And as I settled, I felt this wave of tired. And the first thought was, I shouldn't be feeling this. I should be feeling energized. And then it was, I don't like this. And then there was noticing, oh, not liking tiredness. Oh, allow it, let it be. Can I be with this?

And as soon as there was a real noticing and allowing, it was okay. It was just another stream in the mix of what was going on and kept sitting and just noticing and allowing things until I felt this kind of clutch and I realized, oh, anxious. I shouldn't be feeling anxious right now. There's no re- oh, okay, this too. By the way, this too is kind of a magic mantra. With whatever happens, if you can just name it and say this to it immediately makes room for what's there.

Okay, anxiety. And again, quieting, there's room for the sounds and the temperature and a little bit of a clutch here and there and a little bit of sleepiness. And then all of a sudden my mind drifted into this kind of obsessive thing about buying a car because my car is almost... almost 13 years old and I'm spending a lot on it. I have to get a new car. So, and if any of you've been through it recently, you know, it's abnormal not to obsess over buying a new car because, you know, it's just so much at stake. So anyway, so there I was obsessing going,

I should, you know, what's this obsessing? You know, it felt so incongruent and then wait a minute, this too, this too. So again, recognizing allowing, creating space. And then it was settling and then it really quieted so that when my dog let me know we were done and I started walking there was just a sense of a quietness and feeling I could kind of hear my steps on the ground and hear the sounds around me and just quietness. The two wings, just noticing and allowing and what allows the two wings to really wake us up is when we're simply recognizing and allowing, we become awareness itself, because those are the two qualities of our innate and pure awareness, a knowing quality and a quality

of spaciousness. Okay. Now, sometimes the recognizing and allowing, we're intending it to, you know, keep us waking up. And what happens is that something sticky comes along that's really sticky. And then we really, really need to deepen those two wings and really notice and really make space. And so I want to give you one more example that talks about deepening these two wings before I open it to, I'll have you try that out and then I'm going to open it to your questions. And this is a story that I shared in radical acceptance that to me was a really powerful illustration of the two wings of awareness.

And this is a story about a man who had Alzheimer's and came to a retreat accompanied by his wife. and he had been practicing meditation for about 15 years. He had, so he was a long-time practitioner and he had been a clinical psychologist for many years and he knew what was going on. When we had an interview, a meeting we do these at these retreats, I asked him how it was going and he seemed really kind of cheerful about this. And he said, there's anxiety in different things, but you know, it's okay.

And then he told me a story that was seminal form. He said, you know, when the first onset, it was when it really started getting that his life was radically changing, he was giving a talk to about 100 people and he arrived to give a talk and he went totally blank. So there he was sitting in front of a group of about 100 people and not only did he have no idea of what he was supposed to say. He didn't know why he was there. He didn't know what was going on at all. Like really, really. So, here's what he did. At first, he didn't do anything. He just paused. And this is the beginning of the two wings, that if we want to

break out of our habitual trance, we have to stop. We have to stop. He just stopped. And then he began to name what he was aware of, heart pounding. He just sat it out loud. And then he put his hands together and he bowed. And then he said, afraid, put his hands together and bowed. Ashamed. Put his hands together and bowed. Clutch, clutching in the chest.

Hands together and bowed. And confused, bowed. And so kept naming. And then after a while, then he started saying relaxing and he bowed. And he looked around and apologized, I'm sorry. And one student said this, they said, you know, no one has ever taught us the teachings in this way. And what did he done?

It's these two wings, okay? The wing of recognizing, he just kept naming, contacting what was there, and the wing of allowing our heart, that kind of bowing, that honoring, okay, this is life, this too. Very, very powerful. Very, very powerful. The more we do it, and I sometimes think of as just naming and saying yes, because we're not saying yes doesn't mean that we're saying I love this, you know, I want to feel confused or scared, saying yes just means acknowledging this is the actuality right now.

the moment that you name and say yes, your identity shifts. And rather than being, rather for this man of being kind of the victim of his own, you know, psyche or being a shameful person that was falling short, rather than that small identity, he just became the awareness that was noticing and allowing with respect the life that was here. He opened up. So, But let's try it out. We'll just do a brief exercise and then see what questions you have. This is a brief exploration of the two wings as applied, this is applied mindfulness, to a situation in your life that you want to bring more presence to. So I'd like to invite you to bring to mind something that recurs in your life.

where you end up feeling emotionally reactive and not to choose something that's traumatic or extreme that will not benefit you for a short exercise. Rather, just choose something that's moderately reactive, something that brings up some irritation or anxiety, impatience, frustration. It might be something when you're with somebody, your family,

where you get reactive or something at work, or maybe some behavior you do that you then react to and judge yourself for. As you come up with an example, let yourself run it in your mind like a movie and just stop at the frame where you sense yourself as provoked. as triggered.

We're just going to experiment a little bringing the two wings to the experience going on inside you. Okay? So just let the experience be as real as possible in your mind. If it involves another person, see that person's face. If there's words that are exchanged, hear the words. Sense the room you're in or the space you're in. and sense the worst thing about this. And just notice what goes on in your body and your heart.

You might sense what you're believing right now about the other person or yourself or your life that is part of the reaction. Just sense the whole state your body and mind are in. And you might, to begin with, just notice what happens if you say no to this. If you say no, this shouldn't be happening. this is bad. I wish this would go away. I wish I didn't feel this way. I don't want to feel this. In other words, instead of saying yes and bowing, start with saying no. Just see what happens when you kind of push away what's happening. Tell yourself not to feel your feelings.

What happens when you're not doing the two wings when instead you're saying this is not good to feel? I shouldn't feel this. This shouldn't be having. happening. And just feel what happens in your body when you say no to an experience inside you. Instead of bowing to what's going on inside you, you're judging it. What's it like in your heart and in your body? You can imagine in days and weeks to come every time this is triggered if you were saying, I shouldn't feel this, or trying not to feel it, kind of what that does to your body and your mind. And again, just let yourself feel what actually comes up in the situation. What's the very real experience?

Again, you might remind yourself of the worst thing about it. When this is going on, the thing that's most upsetting or disturbing or anxiety provoking or hurtful. Maybe you're believing at these times that something's wrong with you or wrong with another person. But feel the feelings that go on when the situation comes up. But this time, practice just lightly knowing. noting them and saying yes. Just let the feelings be there. So you're not saying yes to the situation or to the other person.

You're saying yes to what's going on inside you. It doesn't have to be the word yes. It might be as if you're bowing and just saying, okay, right now there's anxiety. Are this too? Okay, there's anger. Okay, hurt. Just to name it.

it and allow it, the two wings. And see what happens in your body when you name it and say yes. Let the yes be kind and gentle. So like the monk and the nun, you're just naming, noticing honestly what is going on inside me right now. And you're bringing compassion, kindness to it, saying yes. It's letting it be. And you might imagine in the days and weeks to come when this situation comes up, what it would be like if you could pause inwardly and just notice the reality of what's here inside you and let it be wakefully, kindly, let it be. Notice this shift in your sense of your own being and perhaps in your capacity to then respond to the world from more intelligence and more open-heartedness.

Okay, so with that as a backdrop, I'm going to open this up now to any questions you might have, any perhaps sharing or questions about the exercise, or questions about your own practice and how you bring it to your experience. Hi, I'd like to hear a little more about the difference between bringing your awareness to a situation that has emotion, has profound meaning on the one hand, other kind, maybe it's not another kind, but an intention to bring your awareness to your body, your breath, a body scan in which you don't want to stay with the thoughts but to let them go completely. Can you talk about that a little bit?

So I just want to make sure I heard the question that the difference between when you might want to notice what your stay with your thoughts and figure things out in times that you really want to let go of thoughts and be more in your senses. Right, to investigate or to experience sensation. Right. You know, there's a lot of time in our life that we need to be thinking. That thinking is integral to being able to plan, figure out, move ahead, strategize. So to know that and to think and be conscious, okay, thinking, thinking this is what's happening right now, is completely appropriate.

But we spend huge swaths of our time when we're thinking, And it's really, we're just in this cocoon of, you know, repeating thoughts that aren't serving us at all. And often the thoughts are fear-driven and are more like planning, worrying, they're fear-based. Those are times, and I'm not talking about when we're sitting formally, but those are times when it becomes really powerful if you want to start transforming consciousness to say thank you very much to the mental gymnastics and come back into the sense. and into our body. So this is regardless if we're trying to do, you know, apply to a healing situation, just to track through the day with this question of, is this thinking in some way serving my life serving other people,

serving work, serving creativity in a good way, or is it really just keeping me in a kind of trance and distracted? So that's one level. And then the other is when you're actually meditating and contemplating and contemplating, and contemplating, there is a role for wise contemplation where you're actually looking at, well, what am I believing right now? That can be a really powerful question. I'll often, when I'm feeling tight, say, you know, what is it I'm believing? And I know that in some way in those moments, I'm believing in something that's causing me suffering.

In other words, I'm caught in some small-mindedness. So that's a useful kind of exploration, but it's really important to come right back into your body again because otherwise it turns into kind of an analytic mental process that actually gets us waylaid. So when in doubt, come back into the census. I hope that's helpful and kind of gets it what you were asking. Yeah, thank you. Yeah. I've been studying Tibetan Buddhism.

and a lot of times you were talking earlier about westernizing things. I was wondering if a lot of times I hear that sometimes what people call insight and is not. And I'm just wondering if, like, how come it's not called cultivating insight as opposed to being called insight meditation. Like, I mean, maybe it's not important, but just curious. Yeah, it's a really good

question, PD, because insight by the general population is often very conceptual. And it certainly, there's valuable insights. We all, you know, oh, I just got this real insight as to why I behaved this way.

It's because I got treated this way when I was very young. And that's not the kind of insight that is being referred to in Vapasana, our insight meditation, which has to do with seeing clearly into the nature of reality. And those insights, while we could put words on them, they really point to something that's beyond language. True insights really can't be captured in words. They're really a knowing that is beyond any mental framing. So just to have that differentiation in mind is helpful, because in insight meditation, the insights of the knowing

arises spontaneously out of presence. They happen when the mind is actually not in a conceptual kind of mode, but rather when the film of thinking has dissolved And then what springs forth in that gap between thoughts is just this pure knowing of how it is. So just to know that it's beyond thoughts is the guidance. And this is then I'll just speak more generally, that probably the centerpiece of most meditative traditions is being able to wake up out of the trance of thinking. And to begin, even, I'd say one of the biggest

insights I noticed people having, especially when they come to retreats, is just realizing, oh, I don't have to believe my thoughts. In other words, thoughts are not reality. They're always representational. They're always, it's just like if you take a photograph of a tree, it's not the tree. that's how different a thought is from reality. But we forget that because we live in thoughts we actually think we're in reality. So it takes a lot of rounds of waking up from thoughts into this immediacy of presence that's mysterious, open, vibrant.

Many, many rounds till we become, that becomes more familiar as reality than the stories in our mind. So that's kind of the, you've kind of allowed me to move from, that's the difference between insights that are mental and the insight that's just pure knowing. So thank you so much. It's a beautiful question. Yeah. So in the meditation that you just let us in, I kind of got stuck and I wanted to understand how to get to the next part to give the quick background. I kind of struggle with when I when I see women degrading themselves or not respecting themselves like I get really angry and then I'm like okay why am I angry pause okay I'm angry because you know I don't want this to perpetuate sexism whatever all this stuff

and then I'm like okay well my chest hurts look at that and then I'm like oh it's okay it's a little girl inside me that doesn't accept that you know, patriarchy exists or sexism and all this other stuff. And then I slow down and then then I get stuck. I'm like, okay, that exists. I feel angry or I feel this or I feel that. But then I just stay there. I just can't get to the next step of letting go. Yeah. So what I'm hearing is you can keep the mic because I might ask you something. What I'm hearing is you, so this is when you feel an anger at women degrading themselves and you say,

okay, well, where's that anger come from? And what I would suggest you do is rather than analyzing the background of that anger, is just to stay with the felt sense of the anger. Like, okay, so it feels like intense pressure and it feels like heat. And so what happens if you just name that anger, pressure, heat, and then you allow it, you say, okay, let this be as much as it is. In fact, invite it to be as big as it is. Give it...

And then it gets even bigger and you feel kind of explosiveness, pressure. Okay, name it, explosiveness, pressure. Let it be as big as it is. Maybe, and I've done this with people, sometimes there's a sense of, okay, it's like bursting out and it's fiery and destroying the East Coast of the United States. Okay, bursting out, fiery, destructive. Allowing it, allowing it.

Okay, now it's destroying, you know, the whole hemisphere, okay, destroying it. And then you just keep letting it be and letting it be and then oh, oh, sadness. Oh, okay, sad, sad, allow that. Oh, grief, loss. And you're actually coming down to what's underneath the anger just by bringing the two wings of recognizing and allowing over and over to the actual experience without any analysis. what you'll find if you just keep recognizing and allowing is that the sense of who you

are shifts. So rather than being the young self that's feeling victimized and is angry, rather than that identity, you become this very awake, tender space that's just compassionate towards it. And then if you move into your life and you see that degradation, you respond with care and intelligence and you can be very engaged and active, but it's not going to come out of a kind of powerless reactivity. It's going to come from your deepest resourcefulness. Does that resonate for you? Yeah, it really does. Thank you. Thank you. So this is just a comment that a lot of questions I get about presence is, how

Why would I want to accept and open to X, Y or Z? We need to care about this and act about it. Why do I want to open to global warming or open to the oppression of women, are open to racism and feel this allowing quality? Well, here's the thing. If we don't become fully present and open to how our body, heart, and mind is experiencing kind of things, we won't be able to respond in the most intelligent way possible. If we're responding from this reflexive reactivity, we actually end up perpetuating the very

things that are so upsetting. So this pausing and coming into presence is what serves responding to the world in a very engaged way that can actually transform. So thank you. Thank you for that. We have time for one more. This is my first time here. And all during the meditation, I had excruciating pain in my back.

Mm-hmm. And after the last exercise, when you said to go in and see what it is, I felt pain in my temples. Mm-hmm. And then I said, okay, okay. And now the pain went away that I was feeling. And then I saw the lights come in. So I don't want to feel my pain.

You don't want... To feel the pain again? Right, right. So thank you for... First of all, thank you for being here and thank you for your sharing. It's actually quite perfect for what we're exploring right now because what I'm hearing is that you felt pain and you brought the two wings to it. You said, you noticed it, painful, painful, and in some way you said it's okay. You know, you kind of

gave, you gave that space and compassion and it disappeared some, right? So the first takeaway is that that very often when we make room for what's there, it frees it to move. Part of what keeps things in place is we're tensing against them and actually what we resist persists, okay, keeps it in place. When we say yes, it frees it to move and change. But it doesn't always free it to move and change in the way you describe sometimes, I have felt fear and I've said yes to it and it's become terror. Because, you know, everything has a kind of vector and it was kind of maybe halfway up in its arc and then it got and then it had to go further and then it went away and then maybe it came back again in a new form. Everything is coming and going and the most

we can do if we want to find a space that has room for the coming and going is to keep allowing things to move through. Now for you, you're really being honest. and saying, I don't want that pain back. That's the thing to name. Don't want. Don't like. Include that. You see, you can keep including.

Not only are we including pain and unpleasantness, we're including our aversion to it. Does that make sense? So all you need to remember is to name it and in some way make room for the reality that's there in the moment and that allows things to keep flowing and it allows you to occupy a larger quality of presence that lets you be balanced and spacious in the midst. It gives you more freedom. Does that resonate for you? Yeah, thank you so much for what you bring in.

And we'll close in a very simple way, if you will, just to close your eyes for a moment. And as we've been exploring, just arrive right here. Just notice how it is in this moment. and be intimate with your experience by simply noticing and saying yes. Noticing and saying yes. Noticing and saying yes and sensing that as the yes goes deeper and you might even experiment and sense how deep can yes go that as yes becomes unconditional, the sense of who we are opens in a vast time.

way. Room for this living, dying world, a sense of grace and ease and freedom. We each awaken these heart minds so that we can see the truth in this moment and open with tenderness to the life that's here. May all beings awaken to that freedom of open-heartedness. and living in the flow of grace in truth. Namaste and thank you. The teaching you have received has been freely offered.

If you'd like to make a donation, learn more about my schedule or programs offered by the Insight Meditation Community of Washington, please visit tarabrock.com and our IMCW.org.