Three Blessings in Spiritual Life, Part 3: A Mirror – Tara Brach

[Music] Namaste welcome friends thank you for being here so this is the third uh week in a 3-week series uh based on the story story of Nai which really explores the three inner strengths that can really serve us on the path and the last of these strengths is spiritual realization insight into the nature of reality so I thought as a warmup to that I would share a poem that I love from my friend and poet Donna Falls settle in the Here and Now reach down into the center where the world is not spinning and drink in this holy peace feel relief flood into every cell nothing to do nothing to be but what you are already nothing to receive but What flows effortlessly from the mystery into form nothing to run from or run toward just this breath awareness knowing itself as embodiment just this breath awareness waking up to truth okay my friends wishing you all blessings there's a story in which uh there's a ship wck and three men end up being stranded on a desert island and they managed to keep themselves alive for a couple of weeks but it's getting really tough but their Good Fortune was they find one of those lamps that has a genie that comes out and says well each one of you gets a wish so the first one says I want to see my wife and children I want to be back home voosh he vanishes second one says oh me too my dog my work send me back voosh he vanishes the third one goes I'm lonely I want my friends [Laughter] back we are um in on the third of a three-part series that really has to do with three wishes but they're all granted to one person uh the theme is coming from the aads ancient teaching test that I've always loved and I once a year every couple of years like to build a talk around it because it's it's a it's a live one for me so in this particular story Nai who's the protagonist uh gets into altercation with his father and there's a really deep conflict and he's also just lost some friends so he's in a pretty much of a crisis his father basically says go to hell which in in their language is go to Lord Yama the Lord of death so Nai makes the grand journey and um goes through fatigue and goes through all sorts of hardship to get to the land of Lord Yama and Lord Yama is so impressed with his um with his perseverance that he grants Nai to three wishes and nachi in contrast to our friends on this desert island um is really deeply in touch with what we might call the wisdom of impermanence he's very aware of the fleetingness of life and so his wishes his aspirations reflect that wisdom his first wish is the wish for a forgiving heart because he recognizes that um to be free to be able to really live fully we need to let go of the armoring that encases our hearts and it's that same understanding that we we can imagine if we're at the end of our life or with someone at the end of their life so much of the pettiness and the resentments can fall away given what we see in those moments so Naik had that wisdom and he was granted that wish the second wish is the wish for what's called inner fire and inner fire is being aligned with our true aspiration it's that Longing To really know truth and to live from love the inner fire is that energy that really propels us on the spiritual path and the understanding is that for each of us and we can look at today and yesterday to see if it Bears true for us we get wayed we forget what most matters to us and we get caught up in all sorts of Pursuits just uh to be more comfortable or obsessive fantasies or defenses or judgments we lose track of of really what matters in some way we're grasping on to what's you might think of it the surface waves are kind of swishing us around we're not living from our depths I think uh Julia Child sums it up in her own way she says in apartment stores so much kitchen equipment is bought indiscriminately by people who just came in for men's underwear we get way laid so getting aligned the third wish that Nai K had was to really know the truth of who we are to know himself in response to this wish Lord Yama said I can't tell you that or show that but he gave him a mirror and he said really it's learning to look back into your own heart and mind that'll reveal the truth of reality so that was the The Third Wish and um this is what we'll be exploring for this final class is this process of really discovering the nature of reality who we are this third wish and all the wishes correspond with our most evolved capacities they correspond with the most recently part evolved part of our brain that has a relational Network in it that is capable of compassion and empathy and forgiveness that has the capacity to reflect and see the big picture and remember what matters not get so hijacked by fears and wants and then this third this mirror we have have what's called reflexive awareness and what that means is that rather than living inside our thoughts inside a kind of movie of this life we have the capacity to look back and notice what's happening oh the thoughts are there but I'm not my thoughts that's the that's the depth and level of it that we can see what's going on and not be hooked when we don't have that when we're living in what you might call the trance of believing our stories Our Lives get very small and confined in fact if there's anywhere in your life you're aware of suffering it's because you're believing in limiting thoughts and ideas and stories about yourself with all the emotions they bring up you're not living from uh the truth of that mindful awareness an illustration this is uh written by Bruce Holland Rogers it's a little bit longer so you might sit back as you listen when he was very young he waved his arms nashed the teeth of his massive jaws and tromped around the house so that the dishes trembled in the china cabinet oh for goodness sake his mother said you're not a dinosaur you're human being since he was not a dinosaur he thought for a time he might be a pirate seriously his father said at some point what do you want to be a fireman then or policeman or Soldier some kind of hero but in high school they gave him tests and told him he was very good with numbers perhaps he would like to be a math teacher that was respectable or a tax accountant he could make a lot of money doing that it seemed like a good idea to make money what with falling in love and thinking about raising a family so he was a tax accountant even though he sometimes regretted that it made him well small and he felt even smaller when he was no longer a tax accountant but a retired tax accountant still worse a retired tax accountant who forgot things he forgot to take the garbage to the curb forgot to take his pill forgot to turn his hearing aid back on every day it seemed like he had forgotten more things important things like which of his children lived in San Francisco and which of his children were married or divorced then one day when he was out for a walk by the lake he forgot what his mother had told him he forgot that he was not a dinosaur he stood blinking his dinosaur eyes in the bright sunlight feeling the familiar warmth on his dinosaur skin watching dragonflies floting among the horse Tales at the water's edge we get lost in a trance of who we think we are or who we think we're supposed to be and you can sometimes look back at your life and see that really clearly certain Seasons when you're very caught up in a certain reactivity might have been around a conflict or a loss are an evu or love but we can see it sometimes in retrospect how caught we were well in the kind of the view that we're exploring in this class we're caught a lot in an idea about life in our stories but not in the immediate experience of what's really going on and what's really here and who am I so from The evolutionary perspective it's totally natural to get identified as a separate self with the stories that keep us limited that's completely natural and we learn who we are through our culture and our parents so to get into the trance is natural and I sometimes describe it as a space suit that we take on to make it through a difficult environment we have a story about ourselves and we have defenses and approaches and strategies to make things work and most of us forget that we're not the spacit and that's actually part of our developmental design to think okay that's I'm the ego and it's also part of our evolutionary design to go beyond that to recognize who's looking through the mask to recognize that tender heart space that that which is listening that which is looking through your eyes right now so this is our this is the developmental potential and if we stay arrested at the level of believing in the separate self with the stories and limitations we suffer what we discover as we start looking closer at what happens when we're suffering is usually it fits into one bucket or the other we're either suffering because we have this feeling like something's missing like you're on your way to something and life isn't okay right now but maybe if only this happens or that happens the partner or the losing the weight or the right job or getting over the sickness then we'll be okay so there's just something's missing and then the other which is they're completely interrelated is something's wrong something's wrong and and scan for yourself check this out how often when you're moving through the day there is a background idea that there's a problem and that something's wrong you know I think of Joseph Campbell and he said that the beginning of every religion is the cry help so developmentally this is part of what unfolds is sensing I'm separate and something's wrong and I need help Rabbi Alan Lou says this is real and you are completely unprepared as he talks about this life that we're in there's that existential angst that comes with feeling like a separate self development and when it's there we can't deeply relax we can relax some but we don't deeply relax and we don't feel a deep sense of intimacy with the world around us we can't really feel unconditional love because there's that defended and that anxiety about what's going to happen on some level our system is being driven by fight flight freeze are are grasp we're trying to control versus that receptivity and openness that comes when we step out of Trance most moments and that you can ask this question there's a sense that I'm not enough I need to be more or else as I mentioned life's not enough so one story a shepherd's on a hillside in uh he's watching sheep playing the guitar you know just really enjoying the clouds drifting over the valley and Along Comes an American Tourist you know you could really turn this into something buy a bit more land more sheep own a slaughter house export the meat you know and then the shepherd says what would that do for me well then you could take time just to relax and play the guitar enjoy the clouds you get the idea right okay so I think of it metaphorically as um you know an ocean that we're an ocean of being and we have these waves of experience and in daily life when we're caught in a trance we're really getting identified and washed around by the surface waves and the spiritual path and this is where Nai was pointing is to begin to look in the mirror and recognize who we are beyond the surface waves who are you beyond the the daily stories that you tell over and over against yourself that Cocoon of familiar thoughts about where you have to be and by when and what can happen and what shouldn't happen the poet Wei Wu y says why are you unhappy because 99% of what you do is for yourself and there isn't one so some some part of us gets it that we are awfully organized around very centered around this sense of Mo and that there's more of a world and then it's a big hook because the needs feel very compelling and the sense of identity feels very solid and in fact you know we've been outfitted through Evolution to pay attention to the needs that are here we're supposed to We Can't Survive unless we notice what this self wants and needs and again it's just that it's not the end of the story you can continue to take care of and attend to the needs of a separate self and realize them more Timeless presence in the background that's truly a refuge that's that's where we're going right now it's a both end we're not trying to extinguish what we need to do in daily life to get by take care of these bodies and and take care of you know our finances and so on but it just that's not the whole of our life there is a presence a wakefulness a love that's possible to open into that doesn't have to be hitched to the stories we regularly circling around in this is uh a story told by Rachel Naomi Raymond about one of her she actually includes it in one of her books about a doctor whose uh father died of Alzheimer's and here's what he writes says for the last 10 years of his life or she writes this part Tim's father had Alzheimer's disease despite the devoted care of Tim's mother had slowly deteriorated until he had become a sort of walking vegetable he was unable to speak and was fed clothed and cared for as if he was a very young child one Sunday while Tim's mother was out doing the shopping uh his brother then 15 and him 17 watched football as their father sat nearby in a chair suddenly he slumped forward and fell to the floor both sons realized immediately that something was terribly wrong his color was gray and his breath uneven and rasping frightened Tim's older brother told him to call 911 before he could respond a voice he had not heard in 10 years a voice he could barely remember interrupted don't call 911 son tell your mother that I love her tell her that I'm all right and then Tim's father died so Tim is cardiologist and he describes this um and that the law required an autopsy and that his father's brain was almost entirely destroyed by the disease and he writes for many years I've asked myself how could he have spoken who are we really I've never found the slightest help from any medical knowledge much of Life cannot be explained it can only be witnessed so I share that with you because there's a mystery behind all of this and when our minds are fixated on our stories we miss out on that mystery there's a a Tibetan teacher soil rache who uh puts it this way he says if everything changes then what is really true is there something behind the appearances something boundless and infinitely spacious in which the dance of change and impermanence takes place is there something a fact we can depend on that does survive what we call death so this inquiry turns us to The Refuge of pure awareness this is where we start saying okay how do we use this mirror how do we look back and begin to discover what we miss out on so often in our day-to-day lives and and we can sense that if our experience of who we are is hitched just to this temporary form this body or these particular thoughts this kind of patterning of our mind um we're going to live with ongoing fear and resistance of what's around the corner because we know that these bodies and minds are impermanent when we recognize the Timeless the ocean then we're not afraid of what's around the corner it said that if you know you're the ocean you're not afraid of the waves and of course if you're if you don't know you're the ocean you're going to be seasick every day you know so when there's that that intuition of a Timeless presence we're not spending our life trying to defend ourselves against death it frees our hearts to love in fact my experience is that the more I get really really awake to mortality the more absolutely unconditional love feels that there's a complete Inseparable uh Dynamic that has to do with opening to death and opening to love this from Kafka or it's actually a story about kfka so when kfka was an older man he spent time sitting in a park and one day a little girl walked by him and she had tears running down her face and he asked her to stop and tell him what's wrong and she told him that her doll was missing and got and she was lost and she didn't know what to do they looked around together and couldn't find the dolls so he said come back again I I'll see if I can find her and a few days later the little girl returns and kofka is there and there's no doll but there's a note and he reads it and the note says I've gotone off to travel some around the world please don't worry about me I'm fine so the girl's somewhat relieved and she returns to the park every week or so and cop is there with another note from the doll and the girl's too young to read so he would read and tell her about the doll's Adventures fast forward to bed kofka is much sicker and he went to the park one last time and this time he had brought a doll and he handed it to the girl and said the travels had really changed her [Laughter] so some years later the the girl is a young woman and she found that there was this little note that had been rolled up and placed in the doll's hand that she hadn't seen and she opened it up and here's what it read you will lose everyone you love but the love will always return in new forms so this is a gift of looking in the mirror that as we begin to sense that space uh that kind of Timeless presence it really gives us room for life to come and go but to sense the love that really shines through all these different forms so let's we're going to explore now the howtos because it is a practice really how we learn to look within and I think of it as two primary domains of training in terms of looking in the mirror and the first is one that we do a lot together as we practice mindfulness here and that is that we look into our body and our heart and our mind and we notice what you might call the waves now we notice the changing forms we notice oh wave of thought and oh wave of feeling in my heart and oh Sensations in my hands and these are we're looking back and sensing the changing forms and this is a really important part of practice uh and it's not an easy part because when we first begin to look inside ourselves and we start quieting the busy mind what often happens is the parts of us we've been running from become more available we Dess the shadow as they say in Psycho Babble word language but you get the idea that the stuff we haven't been paying attention to is more available to us so often there's a layering of waves that we encounter that are unfaced fears or loneliness or places of jealousy or fears of failure that we we just haven't been really looking at I remember when I first went to meditate at the Insight Meditation Society there was a little sign up front and it said self- knowledge is not necessarily good news because we start paying attention and those that's sometimes the first that we get when we're looking in the mirror the waves of kind of what we might call our unfelt life the parts of our lives that need to be included in Awareness Lily Tomlin puts it this way she said I always wanted to be somebody but now I realized I should have been more specific so domain one as we look at the waves and it's really unwise and not helpful if the waves are intense and sticky and demanding your attention to say oh I don't want to look at the waves I want to see the ocean I want to be one with Timeless presence and how come that's not so wise it's an avoidance we're trying to actually push away part of life and we might have some ideas of that vast Timeless presence that we catapult ourselves into but there's going to be a subtle level of tension in our system that actually makes it so it's not really a liberating presence it's very much of a kind of false Refuge okay so if the waves are strong the teaching is start where you are turn the mirror in just be with the waves and being with the waves as many of you know uh really has to do with befriending that there is some uh deep commitment to not pushing away the waves that the only way to transform when we turn the mirror and look at the waves is a full presence with them the gift is when you're fully present with the different ways of experience it will reveal the ocean okay now as you're going to see when you're fully present and open and occupying the ocean it allows you to fully love the waves so this goes both ways so how do we be with the waves I'm going to do talk about this briefly because um this is what we spend a lot of time in uh the talks I give exploring but I'll give you an example of how the waves reveal the ocean uh with one couple that I was in close contact with uh especially over this last season as we were leading up to the fall elections here in United States and as with a number of couples and families around the country uh this couple was divided and um I'm sure many of you if not in your own lives know of where this has come about uh really divided in what their beliefs were what was right and there was a real deep sense of anger and alienation uh she I was more in touch with the woman and she was saying how horrible it was to not be able to talk about all the stuff that was unfolding nationally and express her feelings with her partner because they were so at odds and there was a really a feeling and she felt like they both were experiencing where they were disrespecting each other if you look at the research for couples disrespect is the key feature that can drive a wedge in a relationship so it was very painful it was really crippling so we practiced how do you bring mindfulness and heartfulness to the waves had you turn the mirror and look and see what's happening and view with it using as many of you know that the acronym rain which is really a way of systematically bringing mindfulness and heartfulness so she recognized the anger and R of rain is to recognize a is to allow so she said okay these are the waves of the moment I'm not going to like pretend they're not here I'm not going to try to get rid of them I'm not going to judge them just allow them to be here and then she began to investigate eyes investigate and she found that under the ways first of all there was a belief that was cooking that in some way he was betraying her that in some way she had this notion that they were on the same same views or had the same values and he was betraying values just a belief not forget the right wrong but this is just what she was believing and then the sense I can't trust you if I can't trust your view so there was mistrust and as she continue to investigate she felt real fear real fear that they were going to lose their connection fear and the pain of Separation this is investigate okay now the N is to nurture and the nurture means to in a very deep way to bring a kind and accepting and gentle presence to what's there she used the words this belongs in other words this fear it's part of me it belongs not to try to get rid of it you might try this at some point when you're feeling fear or hurt because we so quickly make it wrong like it shouldn't be here the most nurturing thing we can do is oh this is this is a wave in my ocean right now it belongs just by saying it belongs there's a dissolving of the resistance that actually keeps our identity hitched to it does that make sense to you it's releasing the resistance so she so that was her way of practicing to just send this message to the the place of the pain of Separation okay this too the words this too are really helpful not to push it away this belongs and then to deepen and bring real compassion to it and as I often teach for her hand on the heart and just bringing care and kindness to that part of her that was scared scared she was going to lose a relationship that she had valued as she brought the nourishing of rain to that place she began to feel more spacious and more tender and this is the shift that happens with presence that we begin to occupy a larger space rather than being caught in the fearful self or the angry self she was becoming that presence that ocean that was including the waves it was a larger sense of being she wasn't so threatened and that's when she could begin to and this by the way not one round it's never one shot that's kind of a fantasy a number of rounds but she began to then sense her husband and imagine that he was caught in the same kind of bind a feeling the separation of feeling in some way the mistrust and the distance and the hurt of that and the fear and so when she could imagine that he too was in some in some grip that she had already been in touch with she could start naming what was going on and that invited him forward they could name together their pain which of course brought more of a field of compassion The Edge didn't go away but there's more space that they have to work with it I don't want to like pretend that everything gets you know happily ever after um but there was more capacity by learning how to be with the waves to discover that space that ocean space that could make room for what was going on with them that they could work it out or they're in process it's still fresh when we are fully with the waves that arise we turn the mirror and we see them open to them recognize allow investigate nurture we discover in the space that opens up the ocean nness that the waves are made of now there's a second domain that I want to make time for here with you there are times when we're not stirred up with a lot of waves we we kind of turn the mirror and yeah there's different thoughts or there's some feelings but there's some space between the thoughts and it's somewhat quiet in there and those are times when we can deepen the exploration ation and look not just to the waves the separate forms but start sensing the presence of the ocean itself here's a way you might think about it imagine what it's like to be in a movie theater and how it is when the movie is going on and you're kind of sitting back and you're looking at the screen you get kind of entranced and you're really in the story and uh involved with involved with the whole movie and then it might happen sometimes that there's some gaps in the action that you notice you know how notice how it slows down all of a sudden you become aware of oh I'm in a movie theater and I'm sitting here and I never finish my popcorn then you might even become aware inside of oh I'm a little bit tired and then so you start beginning to be more aware of what's going on inside you well in a similar way you can keep turning the attention backwards when you're at that theater instead of looking at the thoughts in your mind remember this is the movie of the mind if you turn the attention back you start noticing a series of changing images that are created by the beam of light on the screen you start noticing the light itself like just turning back and seeing the projector at the back of the movie theater and then if you really keep attending you can sense the mind of the being that created the movie awareness so rather than fixating on the story you're turning the attention back to sense the awareness and light that's really looking the one who's looking I hope that's a helpful metaphor in just looking in the mirror because for me that really it's like we are spending most of the time in the theater looking at the movie of our mind and this is saying oh shine a light back backwards sense the one who's looking the awareness itself now if it sounds as so teror you can try this out this is one of my favorite exercises and it doesn't matter if you've done this a lot of times I do this all the time just because it kind of flashes me awake a bit so close your eyes for a moment okay this is is an exercise that you're going to be doing for 15 seconds for the next 15 seconds try not to be aware try not to be aware try not to be aware okay that's enough you can open your eyes so how many were successful can I see okay what we notice is awareness is always here usually we're fixated on the objects of awareness okay we're fixated on the thoughts the stories the feelings the waves so we don't notice that wakefulness we don't notice that it's here there's a I I think it was um Aldis Huxley who described it as a reducing valve of awareness that to survive our Consciousness reduces the amount of information we take in to primarily that which is causing threats or might give us some satisfaction or give us a way to um connect or whatever it is that we're wanting or fearing it tells us about that but it leaves out a whole lot else so what we're doing is um as we evolve we're using looking in the mirror to reopen to the whole domain of awareness the background of awareness that we have been missing now again if we turn the mirror and we get a lot of waves then the message is start with the waves start by bringing your meditation practice to your waves but if it's quieter and maybe some of you have noticed this when you're meditating that there's a kind of sense of a ghost self in the background there's kind of a sense of a background someone who's meditating you can kind of almost sense that when it's quieter you can begin to turn the mirror and look at that now we're going to practice this together tonight and for some of you it's going to seem confusing and not too relevant and to others it might even seem a little bit like jarring and to others it'll be oh wow it's not like a hierarchy it's better to say oh wow it's that we're in different mind States at different times and things are useful at different times in our life and you'll find that even if it doesn't serve right now it's something you can come back to with some interest oh so let's look back at the projector and let's look back at the light that's the one who's paying attention there's um an attitude that really makes a difference as you are practicing turning the mirror and John oonu described it this way he said what you encounter recognize or discover depends to a large degree on the quality of your approach when we approach with reverence great things decide to approach us so when you turn the mirror one way to sense reverence is a profound interest and openness and care just what is this really a sincerity um in our culture we tend to strive like okay what is behind the mirror what am I seeing what's there it's got to be more receptive more laidback more relaxed so one way that we begin um is that we start where we are with the senses awake and then we turn back to what's behind that wakefulness so we'll practice now take a moment to find a way of sitting that's comfortable keep it very simple these will be short Explorations and then you might choose to uh Explore More on your own so as you close your eyes and bring bring your attention inward feel your breath and relax with your breath notice if there's any part of your body that wants to let go a little bit right now and as you relax with the breath you might notice whatever changing waves are going on inside you by that I mean whatever you're aware of sounds right now maybe you're aware of the sensations of breathing or maybe you're aware of Sensations in your hand so be aware of [Music] whatever experiences are calling you and then you might ask yourself what is aware of this right now what's what's aware of these sounds or these feelings what's witnessing can you find the witness can you sense the part of you that's aware witnessing sound and sensation is there a place that you're aware of witnessing from is there a felt sense of witnessing then you might ask and what's aware of this what's aware of the [Music] witnessing just relax back just be awareness sometimes described as the backward step noticing what's happening where's the witness to that and what's even aware of that Witness as one teacher describes it as you watch your mind you discover yourself as The Watcher when you stand motionless only watching you discover yourself as the light behind the Watcher the source of light is the source of all knowledge and love that Source alone is go back to that source and abide there that's rear now again be aware right this moment what's calling your attention maybe sounds feelings so you're turning the mirror and noticing the waves what is witnessing the sounds and the feelings what's aware of that as you watch your mind you discover yourself as The Watcher when you stand motionless only watching you discover yourself as the light behind the Watcher the source of light is the source of all knowledge and love that Source alone [Music] is go back to that source and abide there when you sense the awareness that's aware what are the qualities of awareness turn the mirror on awareness what do you notice become familiar with the quality of presence this background of awareness that's here can you sense that it's wakeful you sense that awareness is a wake caught there's a cognition there's a knowing can you sense that awareness is wide open there's no Center there's no boundary you sense that whenever awareness becomes aware of waves there's a tenderness and that natural tenderness that includes these are the three qualities often described as the essence of awareness wakeful open and tender there's nothing more vast mysterious and loving than the awareness that's your nature it's a refuge if you want to open your eyes at any point you can we're going to take the last few moments to as we conclude to say that the same awareness that we usually are not so aware of it's in the background because we're kind of fixated with our attention on the movie screen this same awareness is shining through the eyes and living through the hearts of every being you meet it's it's the source of every being and yet if you look to see it you'll see their face or you hear their words it's you it's not like you can land on a something in fact the deeton describe it that that the true seeing is a seeing of no thing and yet you can experience it this is Juan Raman Jimenez how he describes it he says I unpetal you like a rose to see your soul and I didn't see it but everything around Horizons of lands and of seas everything out to the infinite was filled with a fragrance enormous and alive I edal you like a rose to see your soul and I didn't see it but everything around Horizons of lands and of seas everything out to the infinite was filled with a fragrance enormous and alive so we're coming back now this is a conclusion really to say that when we open to that ocean that Timeless awareness it absolutely has us fall in love with every facet of this living world and in our journey with these three gifts that Nai uh developed really these innate capacities revolving Consciousness we start discovering that each of them is absolutely essential for that freedom that in order to be free if our hearts have any blame any judgment we're divided we're divided from ourself our experience of who we are becomes small and tight others become other so the first gift can we let go of the blame and anger the Judgment the resentment the second gift if we're whed if we're distracted if we're chasing after this and that and we can't remember what most matters to us our days will be actually lost in a spin of Trance so we keep coming back what really matters and then the third can we look within and sense that background of awareness that allows us to celebrate this life and I'll read you the end of the story of Nai we see the young man bowing to Lord Yama a final time totally at peace then as if by Magic the landscape of the kingdom of death changes to the spring rice fields of his native India this in this a last secret is revealed to him death and birth are not separate renewal comes by dying when we have faced death and aloneness when we realize the formless we're unafraid to live and Life Flowers under our feet everywhere we go becomes Holy Ground Naik knew this in his heart and walked off toward his home to embrace his father and start a new life so we'll just end with a moment of uh silence coming inward please if you will closing your eyes we'll just take these few moments to feel in our own hearts and bodies the blessings of these three gifts the first of a forgiving heart just sense this moment if there's anything you're holding against yourself there's any Judgment at any level any thought anything you're holding from the last hour or day or week and have the intention to forgive you might just gently put your hand on your heart and just say forgiven forgiven and notice how even that intention of forgiving softens and when we begin to soften our heart that we can remember most what matters to us to take these next few moments to sense as you move into whatever's next today your life what's the quality of hearten presence that really matters to you what do you want to live from what do you want to express the sign of inner fire as you'll feel kind of sincerity like you're really lined up with who you are this is what matters to me then as if you could look into a mirror back into your own heart and mind just sense the source of that sense the awake tender presence that alert inner Stillness in the background that's here now that's always here the loving awareness that's our true home so as we close together those sitting right here those joined in the field through the podcast we can sense that loving presence and sense the vastness of it and how it can include our own life and those that we know those we don't know that we can hold the Earth our mother in our lap and all beings in our heart we close with that simple prayer may all beings everywhere remember and Trust the loving awareness that's our source may all beings everywhere live in natural and great peace may we touch true joy in living may all beings everywhere awaken and be free Namaste and blessings [Music]

Channel: Tara Brach

Views: 14,457

Keywords: Tara Brach, dharmarain108108108, dharma, meditation, mindfulness, radical compassion, compassion, radical acceptance, trance of unworthiness, healing, emotional healing

Id: tCmvBl1A6lc

Length: 58min 21sec (3501 seconds)

Published: Thu May 30 2024