Aloha.
We're going to try a little experiment in our few minutes together.
So let's do a little guided meditation,
Just for this few moments,
If you can put everything else aside.
Letting go of whatever it is you've been carrying on with,
And just taking this time to go inside yourself,
To meet yourself in a new way.
So get comfortable and relaxed,
Letting go.
And as you notice your breathing,
Put your attention on your breath for a moment.
You can close your eyes or keep them open.
It doesn't matter.
And notice when you're noticing your breathing,
It changes.
That's really good.
And now you can notice,
Is there any part of your body that's tense?
And just put your attention on it.
You don't need to fix it.
You don't need to change it.
Just put your attention on any part of your body that might be tense right now.
And notice what happens.
That's really good.
And if you like,
You can close your eyes,
Drop inside,
And just for a moment,
Leave the outside behind as we discover the inside together.
It can feel so good to leave all the busyness,
All the madness of the world,
All the craziness of the world behind for a moment,
As you drop in to someplace deeper.
And if you can,
I wonder if you can listen to the deep silence that's already present in the depths.
And to do this,
You might have to leave the conversations in your head behind.
They can still be there or not.
It doesn't matter.
It's like a neighbor's dog can be barking,
But you don't have to listen to it.
You can drop in deeper.
Into the barking dogs or the talking to yourself in your head,
To find a deep place,
A place inside that's untouched,
That's completely still,
That's unchanged.
Been here your whole life,
But we get distracted by the noise on the outside and the noise in our head.
But in this time,
Without doing anything at all,
You can allow yourself to sink in deeper and deeper inside.
And as you fall in to the depths of your own spaciousness,
You might discover places that were holding on,
Naturally let go.
Places you didn't know were clenching can open.
Relax as you fall in deeper and deeper into yourself.
And in this completely private place that no one else can enter,
You can be with yourself.
In the depths of silence.
And you can discover for yourself the qualities of love that are already here,
Alive inside yourself.
Not love for something,
Although there's that,
Of course,
The love for family and friends.
But it's there possible to discover a deeper love,
A love that has no object,
That doesn't need an outside.
And if you can fall into that right now,
Is it possible to be this love for a moment,
Pure aloha,
Deeper than any thought,
Deeper than any emotion,
Deeper than any understanding of what love or aloha might be.
It's deeper than any word.
This is who you are,
Deeper than a word can describe.
So what if,
In just these few moments,
You give yourself completely to yourself to find out,
Who am I?
What am I?
What's my function in this world?
And listen to the silence even more deeply.
Now it's possible that when this experiment,
This experience,
Experiment ends,
That you don't have to return to the normal day-to-day consciousness of talking to yourself and having those thoughts and being engaged with the suffering of the world.
But you can be a beacon of peace.
You can be a beacon of aloha and true love just by being silent,
Without speaking,
Without thinking.
Then you can be yourself and the words will come from the silent love that you are.
It's an experiment.
Find out.
See if it works for you.
Thank you so much for taking these few moments.
I'm truly grateful that we had this chance.
Grateful to Akaku for letting us do it.
I'm grateful to you for taking the time.
Thank you so much.
