And now let's just get into a nice comfortable seated or lying position.
I would recommend seated for this,
But if you find that you are,
You know,
Very comfortable flying down,
Try it out.
And we're going to have our head above our shoulders,
Above our hips as always.
Maybe even rocking side to side,
Making sure that we find our balance point,
Wherever that is.
If we are sitting,
Having the top of our head being light,
Floating toward the sky,
And having our tailbone drop down into the earth,
Like an anchor at sea.
I'll encourage you,
If you always usually have your eyes open during meditation,
Try it with the eyes closed.
If you usually have the eyes closed,
Try the eyes open for this meditation.
And if the eyes are open,
Either looking at the ground about repeat in front of you or staring ahead at a fixed point.
If the eyes are open,
Being aware of every color,
Bit of depth,
Texture,
And contrast that enters your vision from the sides of you to the top and below you,
Taking a full picture.
If the eyes are closed,
Taking in this absence of sight,
This absence of vision.
And again,
Noticing if any opinions or thoughts or emotions react to not being able to see or perhaps seeing everything.
And again,
Coming to that state of emptiness,
The empty jar,
The empty mind.
So what I would recommend for this meditation is to find an anchor point,
Somewhere where you can bring the attention back.
Once it is strayed,
Very far off course,
Just choosing what that is for you.
But if you can,
I encourage you to not get so caught up in needing to constantly focus on the anchor point and instead just be as you are in full body presence.
Not being who your friends or family might think you should be or not being what you think you should be,
But simply being as you are with no expectation,
With nowhere to go,
No end,
Desired result or goal.
And for most of this meditation,
We will simply be in this place of emptiness.
And whenever thoughts come and go,
Noticing the empty quality of this thought,
Noticing the empty quality of this emotion or reaction.
And as a practice,
Bringing the attention back to our state of being.
Now we'll be here with you to guide you back,
To insert phrasings or quotes that might help you along the way.
This is a deeply personal practice today.
This is you exploring what emptiness feels like.
Not even striving to be who we are in relationship to others,
People that we may admire or people that we may have a distaste for.
Not even in relationship to previous versions of ourselves while we were meditating.
But being as we are,
No expectation from this moment to the next and the next.
Now,
.
As we practice getting out of our own way of experiencing things outside of us,
We are practicing getting out of our own way to experience and express what is happening within us.
See if you can erase the outline of where you think your mind ends and begins.
A lot of us may hold an image of our mind being in our head.
Some of us may think that our mind resides in this body.
But if the eyes are open or if the eyes are closed,
Possibly seeing if you can expand this empty mind,
This quiet and spacious mind,
To exude outwards to the borders of your walls,
The lining of your ceiling,
The cushion beneath you,
The floor beneath you,
Emptiness all around,
Emptiness within.
See if you can erase the outline of where you think your mind ends and begins.
Going forward,
We're going to begin noting the thoughts or distractions or what have you that may fear you off course from this moment.
And so,
For example,
If I hear a dog barking outside,
I will say,
This sound is empty of anything to identify with or possess.
And then I will return back to where I am.
I can say this either aloud or I can say this in my mind.
And so we take the same attitude with emotions as they come,
Even if they are emotions of excitement and happiness,
Even if they are emotions of anxiety or despair.
This emotion,
This phenomenon is empty of anything to identify with or possess.
Not knowing that this is not discounting your happiness or not celebrating it,
But just having the happiness be within you without needing to possess it to say that this is my happiness,
That I am happy,
But rather that happiness is present.
If a memory comes up,
This memory is empty of anything to identify with or possess.
And if all that is a mouthful,
You may simply say empty when you notice that the mind is elsewhere and either bringing it back to this anchor point that you've chosen or if you were able,
Just bringing it back to this expanse of emptiness that you have found.
Again,
If you would like the full sentence,
It is this blank is empty of anything to identify with or possess.
This discomfort,
This anxiety,
This expectation,
This role that I think I'm assigned to is empty of anything to identify with or possess.
It is this blank is empty of anything to identify with or possess.
You may get to the point that you become so adept at noticing these things as they arise that you notice it before it even happens.
You feel your mind drifting somewhere or churning into some story that you've told yourself over and over.
And before it happens,
You simply say,
Empty.
And just like that,
You are back in your seat,
Back in this room,
Back to this moment.
After fear of introducing an old story,
It's almost like when you were a kid in a classroom and everybody was talking at the same time,
And then all of a sudden there was a break in everyone's conversation.
And then someone said something of color,
And all of a sudden they heard it because everyone was silent.
In the same way,
The deafening silence that you find in this emptiness of being,
Whenever a thought,
Even so much as whispers or an emotion comes or a memory starts peeking,
Knocking at your door,
It becomes more clear to you that something has moved and something has changed.
And it's not our job to investigate it right now,
It's not our job to judge or to react to it,
But to instead realize that we don't even have to go into it,
Because this thing in question is empty of anything to identify with or possess.
Thanks.
Again,
I will read,
When there is nothing in the jar,
The jar is said to be empty.
It does not mean that there is no jar.
In the same way,
When there are no discriminating thoughts,
Such as desire or anger,
In the mind,
The mind is said to be empty.
It does not mean that there is no mind.
No mind only means that the defilements have been eliminated from the mind.
And as we shift into emptiness mode,
From reacting to watching,
As a series of infinitely small events,
You can see that the anger is empty of anything to identify with or possess.
In our final moment of this meditation,
I will ask you just for one minute longer,
One full minute,
To be as fully present with this moment as you can.
Again,
No expectation,
No stories needed to investigate.
Just you and every moment as it comes and goes.
Open your eyes if they were closed.
Going back to this room,
This group.
So how is that for everyone?
