Day 142/365: 30-Minute Meditation | Ajahn Brahm

Enjoy a 30-minute meditation with Ajahn Brahm.

Ajahn Brahm is a popular Buddhist teacher to a growing international audience of people keen to learn meditation and develop a deeper spiritual understanding. He is also the founding father of an emergent Australian forest tradition of Buddhism.

Transcript

So now we can do some meditation,

Which is a wonderful thing to do at this time,

A time for peace,

For letting go,

For relaxation.

So if you'd like to close your eyes now.

And with your eyes closed,

Just relax your body.

Relaxing the body means we must be aware of it first of all,

And be mindful of the feelings in the physical body.

Once you're aware of sensations in your body,

Then you can learn how to relax them with some kindness.

So you're holding nothing tight,

Everything is loose and comfortable.

And your awareness will tell you whether you're becoming more comfortable or more tense.

Mindfulness gives you feedback.

If you find that you are becoming more and more relaxed,

You're not holding the body too tightly,

Muscles are relaxing,

Tightness is loosening,

Then you're going in the correct direction.

Also please recognize just how delightful it is to be relaxed,

How loose the body feels.

So the delight in a relaxed body,

In muscles which are loose,

In tension which has been relieved,

That delight is the carrot,

That's the incentive,

So you can relax even further.

And if there's any tightness inside your body called pain or an ache,

Just be aware of that feeling inside your body,

Send it kindness,

And see if you can relax that feeling,

Open it up,

Stop pushing it,

Stop stretching it,

Let it be loose and open and free.

And your mindfulness will give you the feedback which hopefully will tell you,

Yes,

You're even relaxing inner aches and pains.

Your whole body inside and out is relaxing as far as you can go.

So once your body is relaxed,

You can let it go.

You don't need to worry about it.

You can only let the body go when it's nice and relaxed and at ease.

If there's aches and pains,

You still have to be with your body to relax it,

Otherwise you'll keep interfering with the rest of the meditation.

Once assuming your body is relaxed enough,

Then let the body go.

Now we attend to the mental world,

That inner world of thoughts,

Emotions,

Feelings.

Now we learn how to relax the mental world.

And again,

See if we can let go of two of the biggest burdens,

Carrying around the past and the future.

A short little exercise which I'm going to introduce again is imagine you've been carrying two heavy shopping bags.

Carrying for such a long time,

Your arms ache and your shoulders hurt.

And the bag in your left hand,

On the outside of that bag are written the words P-A-S-T,

The past.

The shopping bag in your right hand has the words F-U-T-U-R-E,

The future.

And each of those bags are filled to the brim,

The left hand with all the memories,

As far back as you can remember and up until a few moments ago.

So much stuff packed into that shopping bag called your past.

So heavy,

No wonder it makes your arms ache and your shoulders hurt.

And the bag in your right hand,

Representing all your hopes and dreams and anxieties and fears.

All that stuff which you project into the future,

That is also so heavy.

We're so afraid,

So anxious,

Planned so much,

Which means our arms ache and our shoulders hurt.

But with the real past and future,

It's your heart hurts,

Your brain aches,

You have no freedom or strength anymore.

So imagine that shopping bag in your left hand,

Representing your past.

Imagine leaning to the left,

Allowing you to lower that shopping bag of the past to the floor.

Imagining that when it reaches the floor,

The burden,

The weight is gone.

Moving your hand away from the handle,

Straightening your back,

So your left arm hangs loosely by your side.

And focusing on the bag in the right hand,

Representing your future.

So many anxieties and fears.

Leaning to the right,

So you can lower that to the floor.

Noticing that amazing point when it meets the floor,

And there's no more burden,

No more weight.

And clenching the fingers,

Moving your hand up.

So now both the right arm and the left arm,

Just hanging loosely by the side,

Carrying nothing.

Allowing both arms to rest,

Recuperate,

And re-energize.

That little mental exercise helps let go of the real past and the real future.

You continue the mental imaginary exercise by looking down at those two bags.

The past and the future,

No one will take them away from you,

You'll pick them up afterwards,

But at least now you can put them down for rest,

For peace,

For mental relaxation.

And you're standing between them in this amazing place of peace and truth called the present moment.

Just being here.

And don't pick up those bags till the meditation is finished.

You deserve the rest.

No past,

No future,

Just now.

And be kind and delight in this present moment.

Just love being here.

And be kind and delight in this present moment.

Try not to pick up the future or the past.

Don't have any plans.

Don't worry about what just happened.

You deserve freedom,

You deserve peace.

Only relax in the present.

Whatever you're experiencing,

Open the door of your heart to this moment.

Just allow it to be no matter what it is.

Don't be critical with all these shoulds and should nots.

Whatever you're experiencing,

Make peace with it.

Be kind and be gentle.

It's the attitude we put onto our experience which creates peace or stress.

Don't change the attitude,

Just let things be,

Embrace them.

Don't be critical of fault finding.

Just open the door of your heart no matter what this is and be without judging.

Within a moment you are as.

See to focus the mind in the present moment,

Just see if you can focus on the breath going in and going out.

Just notice the breath as it comes in.

As it comes in,

You might say,

Breathing in peace,

As you breathe out,

Breathe out,

Let go.

Breathing in peace,

Breathe out,

Let go.

Breathing in peace,

Let go.

Breathing in peace,

Let go.

Breathing in peace,

Breathe out,

Let go.

.

.

.

.

.

Breathing with the breath,

No need to say anymore,

Breathe in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Focusing on the calm and peaceful breath.

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

Breathing in peace,

Let the mind become silent and just be in this moment,

How does it feel now inside of you,

Coming close to the end of a meditation?

How relaxed are you?

How free do you feel?

More importantly,

How pleasurable is it just to be relaxed inside,

And see if you can appreciate the delight of a peaceful mind.

This is what meditation does.

It gets more and the delight and peace gets even more profound and delicious.

It's about letting go,

Relaxing,

Not fighting,

Just making peace.

I'm now going to ring the bell three times.

Don't be impatient,

Just wait for every sound from the gong,

And then open your eyes to end the meditation.

The bell is ringing.

Very good.

Reviews

a lovely breathing meditation: in - peace, out - letting go. just what I needed. thank you 🙏🏻

Delightful as usual. So very fortunate to have these practices from Ajahn Brahm! Many thanks. ☮️💖🙏🕉️

Love your way of leading clearly and insightfully meditation with humour. Wonderful that you offer now 30min Meditations.