Day 022/365: Guided Meditation | Ajahn Brahm

This is a guided meditation with Ajahn Brahm. About 15 minutes of Dharma talk/meditation advice and inspiration. About 20 minutes of guided meditation and about 25 minutes of silent meditation practice. These are followed by a Q&A session/closing thoughts after the meditation practice.

Transcript

Sometimes that's what you tell your mind.

And you think you're being compassionate but it's not compassionate at all,

Telling people to have a nice day.

It's actually putting your ideas onto somebody else.

So it's like mind,

You don't say,

May you be peaceful,

That's not compassion.

So if you want to be all over the place,

Fine by me mind.

If you want to think a lot,

If you want to be crazy,

If you want to fall asleep,

Fine by me.

That's compassion.

Opening the door of your heart to whatever's happening.

Without any judgment,

Without any force,

Without any discrimination,

What's a good state of mind,

What's a bad state of mind?

It's opening the door of your heart to everything.

That's compassion,

That's kindness,

Otherwise called letting it be,

Not controlling it.

That's why the kindness,

Sometimes letting it be you get some sort of idea what it is but you add the kindness and that gives you this other aspect of what letting be is.

And you just let things as they are,

That's called kindness,

Compassion.

And that is much,

Much better.

I often tell the story when you go and visit someone who's sick,

Cold weather,

A lot of people get flu and you go and speak to them and you say,

I hope you get better soon.

And sometimes if that was me I'd say,

No,

If you want me to get better soon I refuse.

I'm going to get better when I want to,

I'm not going to follow your agenda or your timescale.

So whenever you go to see someone who's sick,

If you really understand what compassion is,

You just say,

I will love you if you carry on being sick or if you get better,

It's all the same to me,

I just don't want you to be who you are.

Let it be.

In other words,

Just stop trying to control people.

Stop trying to again force them because sometimes when a person is sick,

Because of all the so-called fake compassion they get,

Everyone trying to wish them to get better soon,

The pressure is on you to get better and it just stresses you out.

All these people hoping you get better soon and feel that you must please all the people who love you and work so hard to get better,

So hard to get better,

You're trying so hard to get better,

That's what makes you sick.

So you can understand,

Just let a person be.

Care for a person,

Don't try and cure them.

Care for your mind,

Don't cure your mind.

Let it be.

Mind,

This is what you want to be right now,

Okay with me.

And if you let it be that much with this wonderful compassionate heart,

Which can love everything,

Even the crazy,

Stupid mind going all over the place,

You really care for it and let it be.

Because you're letting it be,

You are making what I call the good meditation karma.

Letting be,

Making peace,

Being kind,

Real kindness,

Eventually will make the meditation very peaceful.

It's a law of cause and effect,

This is what causes deep peaceful meditations.

Letting things be,

Being kind right now.

Letting it be,

Being kind,

Letting it be,

Being kind.

And then that builds up so much stillness,

So much peace,

You get some very amazing meditations.

So that's a little bit about what kindness truly is.

Okay,

So we're now going to do some meditation,

About 45 minutes.

And once again,

Because many people came in a bit late,

If you come to the meditation class for the first time,

Or maybe just the second time,

You wanted to go to the introduction to meditation class,

That is being held in the room to my right.

This is the ongoing class for those who have some experience in meditation before.

So if you see,

Beginner's class,

The first introduction to meditation class,

That's the room to my right over there,

Because we're going to sit for 45 minutes,

And that's a long time for many people,

Very good.

I don't want to torture you,

Otherwise in 45 minutes you won't want to come again.

So that class is in the room to my right,

Very good teacher there,

You don't have to worry,

You can even take your cushions with you if you want.

Now just some of my favorite cushions,

The room to my right there,

That one over there,

Go in there.

So that's the introduction to meditation class.

Okay,

That's the one,

Yes,

Very good.

And also anyone who doesn't like my sense of humor,

Who get fed up already,

The class over there,

They don't tell jokes.

Okay,

So let's get going.

Very good.

So closing the eyes,

Bringing all of your attention to your body first of all.

And not judging your body,

Just getting to know it,

Quality time with your body.

Many of us,

Including myself,

Get very busy,

Running around,

Doing stuff,

Going places.

So it's great just to stop and check in with my body.

How are you doing?

And as soon as I become mindful of my body,

I know that I need to adjust some things.

Maybe my legs aren't crossed properly or my bottom is not properly positioned on the cushion.

So I adjust it.

As soon as I put mindfulness on my body,

Only then with that awareness can I see what needs to be adjusted.

And I look very carefully because this is important,

I care for my body.

So make sure even my hands are comfortable in my lap.

You can put them on your knees if you wish.

There is no advantage one better than the other,

It's just what you feel is the best for you in this meditation.

As my body is being well adjusted,

I spend a long time on it,

That I do the second layer of relaxation,

Finding out some part of my body which is irritating in pain or tired.

Letting to know that feeling and seeing through the feedback created by mindfulness,

Feeling how I can relax that irritation or pain.

It's always through just letting things be,

Not trying to change things because that just makes them worse,

It's putting pressure on my body.

I just let them be,

Opening the door of my heart to the pain or irritation in my body.

When I open the door of my heart in that way,

Letting it be,

The tension,

The stress,

The pushing,

The pulling,

All vanish.

And I feel that part of my body which is irritating,

Start to recover.

It's like I hold that letting be attitude and notice that the irritation or pain vanishes some more and some more and some more.

In this way I can focus,

Zoom in on a part of the body and relax any irritation away,

Just through letting things be.

It also helps me to focus on physical feeling instead of all this thinking.

I feel my body.

Once I've relaxed my body very,

Very deeply,

Mostly irritations or aches and pains are relaxed away,

Only then do I start to focus on my mind,

Focus on learning how to be peaceful,

How peacefulness can be increased.

So exactly the same process,

Just letting things be.

And after a few minutes I'll be able to just watch my breathing without any difficulty at all.

So I've dealt with the biggest problem for breath meditation starting too soon when the mind is still agitated.

I calm my mind down first of all and then watch the best.

I'm going to be silent now until the end of the meditation.

Let's start horse head.

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Reviews

I love "be kind to your mind". I am finding great peace and centering with these practices. And I do love the jokes. Smiling during meditation is sweet. Thank you. ☮️💖🙏🕉️