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Guided Meditatioin: Intimate Awareness

Good morning. Greetings. This is sitting here in the innermost meditation hall of IMC^[1], and this morning the reference point for the meditation will be intimacy. Intimacy comes from a Latin word, I think intimus, which means innermost or deepest.

Intimacy has two meanings in terms of meditation. One is to be aware from the innermost, deepest place within. It is the place where awareness feels most intimate, where knowing feels most intimate. The other meaning is to have awareness be most intimate with our experience.

We don't stand far away or step back to watch or see things, being aware from a distance as we talked about yesterday. Rather, we get really close. It's so close that it's a place where awareness and sensations meet. It really feels connected to touching, to being in touch with our experience.

It's helped by the phenomenon that sensations and sensing the sensations are inseparable. To have a sensation is to sense the sensation; to be aware of the sensation. So this intimacy is right there, to be right there where those two are the same.

But the intimacy in mindfulness meditation can be even deeper in that we put attention inside of the experience we're having. So if we're experiencing the breathing, maybe in the chest or in the belly, the movements there, it's almost like you imagine putting yourself in the middle of the breathing. You are inside of the whole experience, and from the inside out, you are being aware of breathing.

It's a little bit clearer sometimes for some people around pain. Sometimes it's best to watch and see the pain from a distance; that's the easiest way to have some equanimity^[2]. But sometimes it can be easier to go to that innermost area of the pain, to go inside the pain, almost like you open the door and you step inside of it.

Because pain is not a unitary, singular thing. It is made up of a variety of different sensations, and to put yourself right into the middle of it, the heart of it, and rest attention there, is a very different relationship than even being up against it, touching it.

Sometimes when I've had extreme pain, the way that I've managed to stay somewhat balanced with it is to do that very thing. I let myself enter into the middle of the pain. If I'm right at the edges of it and touching it, it's too easy to be in the reactive mode, thinking about it, or having an attitude about it. But if I put myself right in the middle of it, then something gets quiet. The reactivity kind of falls away, and then the pain becomes something else.

Or if there's pleasure, not just to feel the pleasure, but almost to go into it to feel its component parts. Feel how the sensations of pleasure are dancing, moving, and changing in and of themselves.

So these two meanings of intimacy: finding a place within where awareness feels intimate, to be aware in that place. There's a real intimacy from the inside out that maybe is not felt if you are in the head, watching the experience. And then, to come really close—so close to the experience with awareness that you are sinking into it or settling into it, rather than even being against the edges of it, touching it.

So, take an upright posture, either literally or metaphorically, and gently close your eyes. Take some gentle, long, slow, deep breaths. On the exhale, relax into your body. Settle down into your body like you're lowering yourself into a very nice pool of water, a bath.

Taking a deep breath in, settling in, and letting your breathing come to normal. On the exhales, continue with relaxing the body. Relax the face, the shoulders, the belly. And each time you do, feel or allow or imagine that you're settling deeper inside. The awareness is settling deep, maybe to the most intimate place within.

And from the innermost place from where you can be aware or sense your experience, become aware of your breathing. Find what you think is the center of breathing, the innermost part of the whole experience of breathing. Let the awareness have that kind of intimacy with the breathing.

Not thinking about it, not being "you" who is aware of the breathing, but all of you seemingly settling into the center of your breathing, as if there's an easy chair there in which you can sit. And from there, be aware of the sensations of breathing, how those sensations arise as they are known.

And if, while you're meditating, something else becomes more predominant than breathing, bring yourself really close to that. Close to the emotions. Not to the thoughts, but to the thinking mind. Not to what you're listening to, but inside the listening, in the ears, the sensations of listening. Other sensations of your body that predominate—feel them from the inside out.

With your ability to know, sense, feel, and be aware, can you be more intimate with the experience? Be more intimate by putting aside your stories, your judgments, your feelings of being for and against what's happening. Almost as if you trust whatever is happening in the present moment. You trust that it's okay to be intimately aware of it, and from there, breathing with it, knowing it deeply.

As we come to the end of the sitting, appreciate the intimacy here with oneself. In whatever way that feels like you're aware, is there some place where you can rest your attention within that feels like home or feels comforting? Maybe it's a place that you don't easily share with other people, but in the privacy of meditation, you can open to it. You can settle in it, touch it. Maybe it's in the heart, or maybe there's something deeper than the heart, someplace deeper in the body. It could be anywhere.

The place that's most intimate might be a place where we have the most acceptance of ourselves, the most kindness toward ourselves, the most sense of belonging to yourself in a generous way, in a full way here. And without anyone needing to know, in the privacy of your own meditation, from the most intimate place within where you're capable of love, compassion, kindness, and goodwill—rest in that place.

Let awareness settle and feel where you can have kindness. It doesn't need to be expressed or spoken; no one needs to know about it. There is nothing you need to prove with it or accomplish. Just the simplest place of tenderness, of warmth, the generosity of heart.

And from there, gaze upon the world kindly. From there, invite the whole world into your heart as you allow your heart to become bigger and bigger, until your heart becomes infinitely large. To be able to hold in the privacy of your own meditation all beings everywhere. See all beings everywhere as if they are your relations, your relatives, your friends, your fellow companions on the journey of life.

Gaze upon them kindly, wishing them well. Wish them safety and belonging, and a deep acceptance—a deep possibility of being able to share their deepest place of intimacy with the world. Wishing that they too could know and feel their own depth, and with that, know the depths of others.

May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free.

And may we stay close to where we can have these wishes. Stay close to where we can gaze upon the world kindly and caringly. May our care, kindness, and generosity serve for the welfare and happiness of the world.

Dharmette: Locations for Awareness (3 of 5) Inside Awareness

So here we are at the third talk having to do with the locations for awareness. It's one thing to be mindful and only know one way to be mindful, one way to be aware. But how we're aware, and where we are aware from, can be a choice. It can be variable; it can be different. To have a range of how to be aware, and then to be able to adjust how we're aware depending on the circumstances we're in, is so important.

If we only have one way to be aware, in some circumstances that way of being aware doesn't serve us; it doesn't really work. For example, if we're only intimately aware of the feelings and the emotions of what's happening, and we're feeling our own suffering or other people's suffering, it might feel overwhelming. But if we can be aware not through feeling and sensing, but in the mind's eye or in the knowing mind—in a sense, stepping back and having a bird's-eye view of it^[3]—then the impact of the emotions that we have might not be as difficult as if we're living in them.

But then sometimes, if we're too distant and observing from the head or from a hillside far away like I talked about yesterday, then it might be too aloof and not connected. Sometimes it helps to connect that way, and sometimes it doesn't. If we're often in our head thinking about things and we don't feel what's going on for others or really ourselves, then it's useful to know this way of being present intimately.

As we become more intimate, we generally come in closer to where the sensations are. Sensations are closely connected to where emotions are and how they're felt. There are two ways of being intimate and coming in close. One is like two things touching each other. Sometimes I've given people the instructions to let awareness be like a soft cotton gauze or a soft cotton ball. If there are very difficult things inside, pain or difficult emotions, imagine that awareness is a soft cotton ball that gently taps against the difficulty and then pulls away. It comes close, taps, and pulls away.

We're there to acknowledge, to feel, and to make space for how it actually is. We make contact so we're present, but we don't overdo it by staying there too long. Knowing how to pull back and be a little bit further away makes room for something to discharge, unravel, and settle. It allows for some confidence to be built, to begin feeling that we have some agency with what's going on. We do not have to just be aware in one way and then be stuck there. So, there is this ability to come close, pull away, come close, and pull away. And then sometimes, just be right there, being really present.

Sometimes that intimacy is even deeper, where we are going inside the experience. The emotions, in a sense, are inside the physical sensations we're having. To penetrate inside, it's almost like we knock at the door, or push the door gently and it opens up, and we're able to step inside. What that does is... from the outside, it seems like things are covered; it seems like a single object. But if you unwrap it and go inside, you find out there are many presents inside. There are many factors of sensations and things going on inside of it.

This can be true even in a little square centimeter of pain, tightness, warmth, or pleasure that we feel. It's possible to almost feel like you're not staying on the surface of it making contact, but you're actually going into it and starting to feel what's on the inside, really sensing and feeling it. That's true with ourselves as well, with awareness. Awareness can be, as I've been trying to say this week, variable. How we're aware, where we're aware from—we can be in the head, we can be more distant and aloof.

We could also discover where it feels most intimate. Where is the innermost place where there is awareness, knowing, the deepest places of sensing ourselves? To find that deepest place of intimacy and to settle in there, to rest in there and feel it, takes time. It takes time to feel it, get to know it, and let it expand and spread through the body. And then, to know from there. Maybe the breathing will help here, because you can breathe with it, through it, and into it as a way of staying connected. To come close to the experience to sense it.

This could be true in everyday life experiences, at the largest life level. If you're in a difficult situation, you stay connected for a while, and then you choose to leave for a while to regroup. You go to a distance to watch the whole situation from afar, and then come back. For example, if people at work are a team, working hard and trying to figure something out, and you're part of the intensity of people huddling together and not managing to figure out what's going on or facing some difficulty—find some way to step away and look at it from a distance. See if that regroups you and gives you a different perspective, a different way of coming back, joining, and participating.

In many social situations, a useful skill is to step outside, get some fresh air, and then come back in. So here we have this intimacy: we're close in, and then we learn how to step away. One way that people allow you to step away is to excuse yourself saying, "I need to go to the bathroom." Most people are not going to question what you're doing in the bathroom. What you're actually doing is going to breathe, going to meditate. Sitting on the toilet—not using it, but just having a place to chill. [Laughter]

In all kinds of circumstances, there is this art of coming in close, feeling it, being with it, and then learning how to step away. Finding the right balance and finding out the right distance. Sometimes the right distance might not be as far away as you could be; it's like personal space. How much personal space do you need around people? If they come into your personal space and it feels like too much, in some situations it's good to be three feet away; in others, it could be ten feet away. Where is the right distance that allows you to be most settled and present in a useful way?

The same principle applies to inner awareness, inner knowing, and mindfulness. We can adjust how we're aware. When are we really intimate, and when are we not so intimate? When are we feeling it, and when are we more cognitively knowing it? Different approaches are useful in different situations.

Repeating myself, but it's such an important point: if you only know how to be aware one way, then sooner or later that one way is not going to be appropriate. That one way is not going to be helpful or useful; it might actually be difficult or cause more problems. In some situations, feeling what's happening is not really the best thing to do, while in other situations, it is the best thing to do. At times, being more in the head, maybe observing or knowing it in some cognitive way, is the best thing to do. Other times, it's not a good thing to do. Sometimes, being far away, imagining you are observing from a distance, is best. There are all these different ways and locations of knowing.

For today, if you can, if you want, try intimacy. Try what it's like to really be in touch with things, and maybe even imagine you're actually going into them. It could be something as simple as eating your food. What would it mean to be intimate with your food, rather than eating while you're listening to the news? What's it like to be intimate with sitting in a chair? How would that feel? What is intimacy like in meditation? What is a certain kind of intimacy that doesn't cross appropriate lines? A certain kind of knowing, awareness, or intimacy as you're listening to a friend—they don't have to know that you're feeling intimate, but what's a way of being really there and touching or feeling what's happening internally so you really feel connected?

So, intimacy. Thank you. We will build on this tomorrow. I hope you can appreciate playing around with awareness in mindfulness, in knowing and sensing, and begin living in the playground of these things. Thank you.