Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - Don’t Push Away Difficult Emotions | Bonus Meditation with Sebene Selassie

Episode Date: July 14, 2023

In this gentle meditation, Sebene offers support for grief. She guides you through a practice of kindness and compassion for yourself.About Sebene Selassie:Growing up, Sebene felt like a big weirdo. Born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and raised in white neighborhoods in Washington, D.C., she was a tomboy Black girl who loved Monty Python and UB40. She never believed she belonged. Thirty years ago, she began studying Buddhism as an undergraduate at McGill University where she majored in Comparative Religious Studies. Now, Sebene is a teacher, author, and speaker who teaches that meditation can help us remember our inherent sense of belonging, that our individual freedom affects absolutely everyone and everything, and that our collective freedom depends on each and every one of us. Sebene is a three-time cancer survivor of Stage III and IV cancer.To find this meditation in the Ten Percent Happier app, you can search for “Working with Grief.” You can hear Sebene, along with teacher Jeff Warren, on the Meditation Party episodes:#553. Meditation Party: The Sh*t Is Fertilizer Edition#601: Meditation Party: Psychedelics, ADHD, Waking Up from Distraction, and Singing Without Being Self-ConsciousMore info on the upcoming Omega Institute Retreat (available in-person and virtually) with Dan, Sebene, and Jeff is here. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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It's the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Hello, everybody. Happy Friday, time for a bonus meditation. If you listen to the show this week, then you know that we spent quite a bit of time dwelling on the subject of death. We talked to a death doula. We also talked to Andrew Hollachek, who's an expert on lucid dreaming, which is actually used in some Buddhist circles as a preparation for death. So, give it all the death talk. We thought today we would post a meditation on the equally

cheery subject of grief. And this can be for people who have lost somebody recently or just grief for all sorts of things, losing a specific time in your life, losing a relationship, feeling like time is moving too fast. We're all grieving in some way because we're living in a world of unrelenting change. Our teacher DuJour is the magnificent Seven A. Celassie. She was born in Ethiopia, grew up in Washington, DC, and now lives in New York City, where she teaches rights and speaks about meditation. You've heard her on this show, of course, as part of our meditation party series, and you can find her all over the 10% happier app. So here we go now with Seven Ice Elassy.

Hi, this is Seven A. Grief is not something that's talked about very much in this culture, but it's something all of us will experience in one way or another, probably at many moments in our lives. This short meditation is an invitation for us to open up to grief, not trying to get rid of it, simply bringing awareness to it. You may already have some thoughts, emotions, memories, or even bodily sensations that are coming up related to your loss.

But rather than getting caught in your usual patterns of thought or story about this grief, we're going to use a simple acronym to help us work with grief. It's called RAIN, R-A-I-N, and it stands for Recogn allow investigate natural awareness. So let's get started. We'll begin this meditation by settling into this moment, closing your eyes if that feels okay. For the r-of-rain, first you're going to recognize what's happening. But rather than work with these emotions as thoughts, see if you can recognize grief

in the body. Where do you feel the grief? Usually emotions can be felt somewhere between the groin and the head. Often in the belly, the chest, or throat. If you can't locate this emotion in your body, don't worry, you can work with the emotion itself, recognizing what's going on for you. Perhaps fear or anger or sadness, confusion or guilt. See if you can know what's happening.

Not getting lost in the A of brain and allow grief. Often we want to push away strong or difficult emotions, but we actually need to allow our grief in order for it to eventually have a healthy release. See if you can find a genuine sense of welcoming your emotions as a natural and healthy part of your process of grieving. allowing the sensations in the body and the emotions connected to them. Next, we will go to I and investigate what's happening by bringing a kind curiosity to our experience. You can ask yourself, what is this emotion or sensation asking of me. What's underneath this and what's really needed right now? I'm seeing if you can Finally, we'll move to the end of natural awareness. We don't need to do much for this step, except have kindness and compassion for yourself with your loss and grief?

On the next exhale, you can open your eyes, connect to the space around you, and move your body and whatever way feels good. I hope this was helpful for you. Thanks for listening, and see you next time. Thanks again to 7a. You can find more meditations like this one over on the 10% Happier app. Also check out the meditation party episodes we've done with Seb. I'll put some links in the show notes and if you're a fan of

Seb's, a fan of this show, a fan of mine, actually we're doing a meditation retreat together in October at Omega, which is outside of New York City. I don't think there are many seats left, but you might be able to snag one, but if there are no seats, or you can't come because you're not close by, you can also tune in digitally. So we'll put a link to that in the show notes. We'll see you right back here on Monday for a brand new episode. We're doing a full week of Joseph Goldstein. Hey, hey, prime members. You can listen to 10% happier early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and ad-free with 1-3-plus in Apple Podcasts.

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