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Guided Meditation: Mindfulness as Truth-Telling

Good morning, and good day everyone. Waiting for seven o'clock to start, I just delight in seeing all the greetings and the locations you are greeting from. It is very heartwarming to come together this way. Thank you for being here, and thank you for being part of it.

I think of honesty as mindfulness out loud. When we speak honestly, we're practicing mindfulness out loud. When we speak honesty to ourselves, then we are practicing mindfulness. The ability to sit and be mindful of what's happening with us, what's happening in our experience, is a movement of saying as honestly as we can, recognizing as honestly as we can, what is happening here.

Certainly, many of the times, what we're aware of wouldn't necessarily be something you felt you had to be honest about in the conventional way—you know, like just recognizing the sensations of your breathing. But there are times when what we sit with, and meet, and really practice with in meditation practice, is difficult truths about ourselves. To have a kind of self-honesty—there is something very freeing about honesty and speaking the truth, if we can do it kindly, if we can do it in a way that really focuses on how to be honest beneficially.

Just think of meditation as sitting down to kindly and beneficially recognize what's really happening here for us. To breathe with that, to open to it, to hold it in the palms of awareness. Not much needs to happen. The power of truth is really powerful. The power of honesty, just being with what is in a clear way. "Clear" means really recognizing it, but not being in conflict with it, and not necessarily trying to fix it. Here, to be present to this in an honest, simple way.

Finally, I think of this kind of self-honesty as coming home to a simplicity of being. The complexity of being is when we're struggling with what is true and what is happening here. At heart, mindfulness brings us to a simplicity of being at this truthful center of all things.

So, to start this meditation practice, take your seat for meditation. That expression is sometimes used metaphorically or symbolically; it doesn't matter what posture you're in. But to take the seat is replicating, in your way, the Buddha taking his seat under the Bodhi tree. To take the seat where you will be true, where you will recognize the truth in a dignified and noble, maybe even a devoted way. To sit here in the midst of what's true.

Close your eyes and settle in. Taking some long, slow, deep breaths. Breaths that are relaxed and easeful. Only breathe as deeply as is comfortable for you, and only exhale a little longer than usual, as far as is comfortable enough for you. Letting that longer exhale be just the right length that, at the end of the exhale, you can pause before taking in the next deep in-breath. And perhaps there's also an ever-so-slight pause, or slowing down, at the top of the in-breath, so there's more intentionality and awareness going into the breath, a definitive connection.

And then, as you exhale, relax your body. Relax into this moment as if this body at this time is a place you can deeply trust. Trusting, and trusting yourself as you let go of your exhale. Releasing the body, settling into what is true here for you.

And then, let your breathing return to normal. As you exhale, continuing to relax and soften in your body, releasing the holdings in different parts of your body: the face, the chest, the shoulders, the belly. Maybe even releasing any tension in your arms and hands.

For a few moments here now, not doing much, just sitting here looking around within and recognizing what is true right now for you. What is true about your body? What is really going on for you with your emotions, your mood? And what is it that is preoccupying your mind and your thoughts, if anything? What is really happening for you here, if you look around and really feel in? Maybe even feel deeply into yourself, feeling into the truth of yourself, to what's really happening here, as if that's a doorway for continued letting go, release. Not abandoning anything, but the release that allows you to settle in more deeply to what's happening without reacting, fixing, pulling back, or getting caught up in thoughts about it.

Saying the truth to yourself has a way of coming home, coming settled. Recognizing what's happening is a way of moving towards more ease and peace with what is, without conflict, without shoulds and shouldn'ts. In a certain way, for these few moments here, without concern about the past and the future, just the truth of this experience of now. Trusting that's enough, just to know and be honest about what is now. The future we don't know.

And then becoming attuned, in the middle of it all, to your body breathing, in whatever way is most comfortable for you, or most comfortable for your body to experience the rhythm of breathing in and breathing out. Maybe as if the breathing is what keeps you close to what's happening, without thinking about it or pulling away. Maybe even breathing through what's happening in the present moment. As if breathing is at the center of what is most true for you. As if the breathing is a caring, compassionate, kind contact with what is true. Nothing is a problem; it's just something to recognize and meet with kindness and care. Quiet, trusting that being truthful, being with what's true, is enough. It's enough to allow the power of truth to do its own work, as we stay here now in the present, breathing in the midst of it all.

The future is an imagination, the past is a memory. What's happening outside of wherever you're sitting, in other places, is also unknown, an imagination. It is maybe an anxiety or a worry, but it's a kind of imaginary virtual reality of the mind. We don't really know the future or what's happening far away. What we can most reliably know is what's happening here in our direct experience. And to do so makes all the difference. This here, to be truthful with direct experience, is the way to freedom.

With a quiet mind, however quiet or calm it might be, or that you can allow it to be for a few moments, what is most true for you? What is it that's really going on for you from the depths of your being? What's most important for you? And what relationship is there between really recognizing what's happening in the moment, in your direct experience, and allowing a simplicity of being in relationship to that? Not needing to do anything or fix anything, just the simple knowing: this is how it is.

And maybe, as we come to the end of the sitting, maybe there's some valuable way in which being truthful and being yourself can be the basis for a richer, more honest meeting and connection to other people. Without leaning forward into people or pulling away, but offering a kind of fullness of yourself to be present, to listen, to witness, to be with others. Whether it's in person, or through some device of communication^[1], or other ways in which other people come into our consciousness, maybe the news. To listen and witness, recognizing that others have a depth inside as well. If they were really truthful, if they were really connected to the depth of their being, their simplicity of being, you would probably naturally be kind and supportive and have compassion. You would naturally meet them in their humanity.

May it be that as we come out of this meditation, we have the presence of mind and heart to recognize the fullness, the full humanity of others, and to wish them well. To care for their well-being, and to see what we can do for those that are near and far that is supportive for them—supportive for their happiness, well-being, and safety. May it be that in a way that's in harmony with the ease and freedom of the dharma, of meditation, of mindfulness, that we live for the welfare and happiness of all beings. May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. And may all beings be free.