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Guided Meditation: Balancing Doing and Allowing

Warm greetings to all of you, and happy to be here to sit and to practice.

There are two broad categories of activities associated with Buddhist meditation. One is what we do, and the other is what we allow. The balance between what we do and what we allow is part of the art of the practice. That shifts back and forth over time at different states of meditation, different states of settledness, and even different parts or phases of our life. But to be attuned to these two parts, and to become wise about when we have to apply ourselves and do something, and when we mostly get out of the way and allow something—especially allowing something that's really skillful, wholesome, and good, making room for it, allowing it to move through us.

Often when we first sit down to practice, there's a lot of doing, in the sense that you have to sit down—that's an activity. And then we have to do the settling of our body and arranging our body in some nice way. We do some of these things like I teach: breathing in deeply and relaxing the body. These are all doings, in a sense, that are in the service of a deeper settling that then will allow something to happen. It will allow settling; it will allow letting go. To hold both in our hands, in a sense, in meditation, the two can go hand in hand like a left and right hand washing themselves. We both engage in the practice of being aware and mindful, and we also are making room and space for something too—some deep thing inside to arise, to well up, to unfold, and for things to move in a good way. I'll talk more about this later, but with that introduction, we can first engage in taking a posture.

I think of the care that goes into finding a good posture to be the beginning or a continuation of our mindfulness practice: to be mindful of how our body is, and how to position it in a way that works for us, both in a large way but also in small, subtle ways. We make small adjustments in where the weight of our body settles, to feel whether the center of gravity or the centerline of our weight is balanced, maybe through the spine, or whether we're leaning forward and the weight is a little ahead of ourselves, or leaning back and the weight is behind us. If you hung a plumb line down through the center of gravity, see whether your weight is balanced. Is it really right through your body, right at the center of that line, not leaning sideways?

Perhaps also adjusting how your head fits on your neck and on your shoulders. Sometimes it's nice to rotate your head side to side, tip it side to side, tip it down, roll it around, and just kind of let it be. See if that neck and shoulder area can be relaxed. Then perhaps making a little bit of space between the last vertebra and the skull.

Two more doings that we do: one is the doing of relaxing, releasing the holdings in the belly, releasing the belly so that it hangs forward and settles downwards. There's a way in which, as the belly relaxes and expands, what's above it can also settle—the area around the diaphragm, the solar plexus.

It might be possible to also relax or release the shoulders, and it might also be possible to pull the shoulders back just a teeny bit, within a natural way of being and not forcing it. Perhaps letting the shoulders come back ever so slightly, a centimeter, letting the middle of the chest come forward, maybe upward a teeny bit—not with effort so much as allowing the chest to open.

If your eyes aren't closed yet, you might gently close your eyelids and imagine that your eyes are being refreshed with coolness, a cool, refreshing, relaxing feeling in the eyes as the eyes rest in the back of the sockets. You might also drop your mouth open gently so that your jaw is relaxed, and then softly float your mouth back together so your teeth are almost touching.

Then open to the body breathing, perhaps ever so gently taking a little bit fuller, deeper breaths than usual—not forcefully, but a little more conscious, open, and deeper breathing, hopefully in a way that feels comfortable and nice.

Then letting your breathing return to normal. After all that doing, sit quietly now and see what happens to you if you don't do anything except stay aware. Be curious with a quiet mind, without thinking about what's happening so much. We're letting thinking be in the background, and in the foreground a quiet interest. If you sit quietly this way, what unfolds? What sensations of your body arise and express themselves? If you allow things to be while being aware, what is it that wants to settle? If you allow things to be and feel the silence and stillness that's here, what wants to be revealed or known?

If what you know is pressure, tension, or contraction associated with thinking—maybe in your forehead, behind your forehead, in your brain, around your eyes or jaw—perhaps you can relax and soften the tension. A kind of relaxation that either relaxes the muscles or relaxes around it to make space for the tension, to allow it to be there with lots of room, not making it a problem.

The art of doing and allowing can be done at the same time. While focusing on breathing, allowing yourself to experience the body breathing, allowing the body to breathe itself—the doing is to have the awareness, intimately attending to the experience of breathing, allowing the rhythm of breathing to have a nice influence on the body. The rhythm of the body breathing is like a massage that helps things become fluid and softer.

If you can be careful with how you're mindful, I think mindfulness itself has qualities of softness and allowing, even if it's directed towards breathing. It is as if the mind that's aware is also massaged, quieted, and settled by the rhythm of breathing in and breathing out. Allowing your life, your concerns, to become simpler and simpler so the main concern is the practice of being with and allowing the body breathing.

In meditation, the doing is to have present moment awareness. Within that awareness, whatever is known, allow it to be there. Allow it to unfold and move; don't freeze it with your ideas and judgments. Present moment awareness allows and has room for all things.

If you allow what's good inside, you might allow whatever wholesomeness, goodness, or whatever feels right, deep inside in that quiet mind of meditation. Allow it to be there, allow it to have room to grow and to unfold. Making room is similar to allowing. Allow what's deepest in you to have space to show itself.

Reflections

As we come to the end of the sitting, I'd like to say that a lazy person will all too easily give in to the impulses we have on the surface. The lazy person won't give the time to connect to what's deeper in us. Forces like greed, hostility, resentment, certain kinds of anxiety, and doubts belong more to the surface of the mind and the surface of the heart. But things like love, generosity, kindness, peacefulness, and even wisdom belong to what's deeper, more intimate.

If we don't give in easily or lazily to the surface impulses of unwholesome ideas, but rather do the more difficult, patient work of finding our way to a connection to the deeper impulses—what has deeper integrity or wholeness within us that doesn't fragment us, but rather makes us whole—this is a task of meditation. To allow those deeper wellsprings to surface and express themselves in our life.

May the depth of our goodness be available for us today to inspire us to live with care, with compassion, with love, with friendship, kindness, and goodwill. You might want to consider for the rest of the day, or this evening or tomorrow, what are some of the activities you'll be involved in that you can plan ahead? Think about how you can do those things with a deeper goodness inside of you, with care, kindness, love, and generosity, especially for any encounters you have with other people.

And may it be that the meditation practice we do not only benefits ourselves but is a source and foundation for benefiting this world. May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be safe enough to allow the depths of their goodness—may they feel safe enough to allow what's good to then come to the surface.