And in our meditation today,
We're going to do a bit of a visualization about your own growth,
Your own beinghood.
And then we will sit in silence for a little bit at the end of that visualization.
And when we're sitting in silence,
The practice is really just to open to.
.
.
We do practice non-dual meditation here.
So we're just practicing to opening to what is,
As opposed to a focused meditation on our breath.
It's an open awareness meditation to kind of relaxing in to what is.
So I will guide us through.
So we wake up the bell with a little sound just to remind it that it's about to be rung and then to remind us to listen.
And then with each ring,
We send it up and out.
And we take a breath and come into this moment into our bodies.
So we can allow ourselves to land here.
And one way we plant ourselves is just from the outside in.
So listening to sounds.
Feeling where our body makes contact with the ground.
Maybe even pressing down a little bit into the ground and noticing how it lifts us up.
Brightens our spine.
From the outside in,
We can take a breath.
A nice,
Slow,
Long breath and take in the out and let out the in.
And as we land here,
We can also climb inside our body.
Feeling the aliveness of your own body here.
So that may be the pulsing in your hands.
Or the movement of your breath.
Breathing in,
I am alive.
Breathing out,
I am here.
Alive.
Here.
And this life of yours that's here,
X marks the spot.
This life of yours has been around for a while.
So you can almost imagine there's like a timeline to the left side of your body that goes all the way back in time.
10,
20,
30 years ago.
All the way back to you being born.
The cracking open that happened when you were born.
But it started well before that.
The timeline goes back to the cracking open.
Maybe of your parents.
Willingness to have you.
The cracking open of your ancestors.
All the way back,
It goes back so far to the explosion,
The cracking open of a star.
This timeline of you.
And then to the right side of your body,
There's a timeline of you that will continue.
It'll move through this day,
Into your morning,
Into your evening.
Into tomorrow,
Into the next decade.
And at some point it will come to a close on this earth,
But it will continue on through your actions.
Every step you take,
Every person you meet carries on.
On and on and on forever.
So here you sit and X marks the spot of you breathing in,
I am alive.
Breathing out,
I am here.
Breathing in,
I am alive.
Breathing out,
I am here.
And at this point,
This X marks the start of your life,
There's something that is cracking open now.
There's something you're growing in.
And you may feel lost.
You may not know.
These are good things.
So I'd like for you to imagine that you could go back along the timeline of your life and choose one time,
When you were younger,
A moment in your life that maybe something cracked open in you.
And it could be recently,
Like a year ago or two years ago.
Or it could be back to when you were a little kindergartner.
Or a 13 year old in a school play,
Like a time when you were cracked open by life.
When something shifted for you.
And I'd like for you to imagine that you could go back along that timeline and meet yourself then.
And see yourself then.
How you were becoming more authentic.
How you were becoming more flexible.
See how you also were becoming more focused.
You learned something about what you wanted to focus on or what mattered to you.
And also see how back at that time,
You were learning about what it means to be out of harmony and in harmony.
And I'd like for you to see yourself at that time as something beautiful,
A bodhisattva,
Someone growing.
And then I'd like for you to imagine you can take your own hand and bring that being,
That younger version of you,
Back with you to sit right beside you.
Carrying those qualities.
The strength.
And growth.
And then I'd like for you to imagine that you could look out to the right side of your body.
And see the growth that may possibly become for you as an older version of you.
It could be you two days from now.
Or you two years from now.
Or you two decades from now.
An older version of you that's maybe gotten to the other side or through this place that you feel lost in.
A version of you that is authentic.
A version of you that is flexible.
A version of you that is focused.
You know what to emphasize.
And a version of you that is in harmony.
In harmony with your body,
In harmony with others.
Allow that version of you to walk towards you.
That's you with growth.
And they sit down right next to you on the right side of your body.
And you can feel them stabilizing you.
Your younger self stabilizes you and supports you on the left side.
And you grow a little bit taller,
A little bit stronger,
A little bit more open in your stance.
And the right side stabilizes you.
You grow a little bit taller and stronger.
And in the middle,
Here you are,
X marks the spot.
You're a little bit lost.
You're being cracked open.
And that's a good thing.
So take in that breath,
That long breath.
You are alive,
Exhaling.
You are here.
In that in-between space.
That thing totally unknown is usually what you need to find.
And so in this space where you feel the support of the growth that you've experienced in life,
And the trust in the growth that is happening for you and will happen for you,
You can take a noble stance.
And then you can just let go.
And let be.
Bringing your full awareness to what is here.
To your current experience.
Your experience of sound and breath and being a little bit lost in the space of the unknown.
So I'm going to be quiet for a little bit,
And we'll just practice in silence,
Sitting in this space,
In the in-between.
And if you get a little bit lost,
You can just remember that if you're lost,
The best thing to do is to get present.
Breathing in,
I'm alive.
Breathing out,
I'm here.
And if you get a little bit lost,
The next best thing is to radically accept what is here.
Radically accept what is here.
And if you get a bit lost,
The next best thing is to say,
I don't know.
I don't know,
And I don't need to know.
And if you're a little bit lost,
The next best thing is to remember you're not the only one that's lost.
We're all lost,
A world of people that are lost.
So not alone.
And then we do it again.
We come back to breathing in,
I'm alive.
Breathing out,
I'm here.
I'm here.
That's enough to just practice that.
And then we radically accept what is here.
Physically accepting what's here in your body.
Mentally,
What's happening in your mind.
The chatter.
Emotionally.
And then just also contextually just accepting what is here.
Whether we like it or not,
It's here.
And we practice this beautiful practice of I don't know.
And I don't need to know.
I don't need to know.
Such a relief to just let yourself have this time to not know and not need to know.
And then to feel connected,
Interconnected with this space,
But also all the beings outside of here.
Everyone who was a little kid once and everyone who's going to grow up.
And is growing up.
So I'm going to close with a little,
A bit from Shel Silverstein on growing down.
One day we said to grow up around,
Hey,
Why don't you try growing down?
Why don't you crawl on your knees?
Why don't you try climbing trees?
Why don't you bang on a little tin can?
Why don't you bang on a tin can drum?
Why don't you chew some bubble gum?
Why don't you play kick the can?
Why don't you not wash your hands?
Why don't you join the baseball team?
Why don't you jump and yell and scream?
Why don't you try skipping stones?
Why don't you eat the ice cream cone?
Growing down.
It's a good thing.
So we close with the three refuges,
Which are sort of three places we can take refuge in.
And the first refuge of your being,
Your true nature.
And we take a bow to the first refuge of your being and your true nature.
And then the second refuge is to becoming.
And that refuge is we take refuge in our teachers and teachings and what we are becoming.
And the third refuge is the refuge of our sanghas,
Our communities in this room,
Outside of this room,
Our larger global community.
We can take refuge in community and our belonging.
So being,
Becoming,
And belonging.
And the three refuges.
Thank you.
