This is an AI-generated transcript from auto-generated subtitles for the video above. It likely contains inaccuracies, especially with speaker attribution if there are multiple speakers.

Guided Meditation: Letting Be

Warm greetings from IMC in Redwood City, California. In various stages of Buddhist practice, a very important part of the practice is something in the family of letting go. There are many different nuances or shades to that—different aspects of letting go—and the one that I'd like to emphasize today is letting be.

Very closely related to insight practice—Vipassana^[1] mindfulness—is the ability to be very present and aware. It involves recognizing what's happening in the present moment, and doing so without any movement of being for or against the experience. We do this without any movement trying to do something with it or recoil from the experience, but just to let it be.

It is a little bit not quite what it seems, because to let something be, sometimes we have to let go of our desires and aversions to it. But we can also let be those desires and aversions. The idea is that we are stepping back to observe or to be present for whatever is coming and going. Whatever is happening, and even if we're for and against the experience, if that's what's happening, just let that be. In that letting be—just leaving it alone, not picking it up, not pushing it away—nothing needs to be let go of. Let everything be.

To be able to come to that place, we often begin the meditation by a certain form of letting go, which is relaxation or calming. Take a meditation posture and gently settle into your posture, perhaps with a caring or tenderness for your body and for you. Be a little careful so that, even with nuances in the posture, you're lining yourself up and getting yourself settled. Put yourself into a posture where all the little, maybe even micro-muscles, are getting lined up and established to be alert and aware.

If you're sitting upright, think of the spine as a firm, strong pillar from which everything else in your body can hang. The spine is strong and alert, and this is there to support everything else to relax and soften.

Closing the eyes, gently and kindly take a little deeper breath than usual. Slowly, leisurely exhale and let that breath release. In taking these deep breaths at the beginning, maybe you can do so leisurely, as if you have all the time in the world to breathe. As you exhale, leisurely relax.

Then, let your breathing return to normal, and leisurely—as if you have lots of time—calmly let the attention roam around the body. If you find any place where there's holding, tension, or tightness, on the exhale, soften and relax.

Letting your body settle, become more attuned to the body's experience of breathing. This is where letting be begins. Just let your body breathe the way it does. Let it be. Even if you're controlling the breath or breathing in a forced or uncomfortable way, we're training ourselves to be okay for these few minutes of meditation to let it be. And in letting it be, be aware of how it is.

At the end of the exhale, let it be leisurely. There's no hurry to breathe in; you can just let things be, and the natural functioning of the body will begin the inhale. At the top of the inhale, a gentle letting be in the natural release of the exhale will begin on its own.

That letting be is not removed or aloof from experience. The letting be can include a quality of receptivity. Allow the experience to be intimate, or allow it to be received—received in how the body experiences breathing.

If the mind wanders off in thought and you notice it, part of the art of letting be is to let that be. The letting be comes from a kind of strength or stability inside that is not involved with the thinking. It is not bothered by the thinking, and has no need to let go of the thinking, but lets it be so it is seen clearly for what it is: this is thinking.

If the thinking is strong and compulsive, that clear seeing of thinking can see it: this is compulsive thinking, this is strong thinking. There can even be an expression of amazement: wow, that's a lot of thinking. That clear recognition is a kind of stepping away, or being independent of the thinking. The mind no longer is the thinking; thinking is just a part of the mind, something that can be observed and known. When the thinking is no longer compelling, or you feel like you've acknowledged it enough, begin again with your breathing. Receive the experience of breathing into awareness and let it be.

While you're sitting, watching, and feeling the breathing, inevitably your mind will focus on something else—on thoughts, emotions, or body sensations. Wherever your mind is drawn, use that as an occasion to let that experience just be. You're not involving yourself in it or reacting to it. You're not getting involved in your preferences or your judgments about it, but just letting it be so that you can know it in whatever clarity of mindfulness that is available. And when you feel you've done it enough, begin again with your breathing.

If you find yourself clinging to anything, attached to something, let it be. Not to condone it or participate in it, but also not to let go of it or push it away, but let it be so it's known clearly. Let it be so awareness is not pulled in to be involved with the reactivity to the attachment. It's just known.

To help you let things be, you could use the label just. Just breathing. Just thinking. Just feeling. Just sensing in the body. That word just can be a support to leaving things alone, not building stories, reacting, or interpreting something in complicated ways.

Letting be gives us the opportunity to allow each thing to just be in the simplicity of how it appears in the moment, almost as if there's no past and future to it. It's just a breath. Just a thought. Just an emotion. Each thing is respected for what it is in the moment—nothing more and nothing less. Letting it be as it is in the moment.

Reflections

One of the qualities or aspects of letting things be is that each thing is respected for what it is. Each thing is allowed to be without the overlay of our projections, our preferences, our desires, our aversions, and our bias. Learning this ability in meditation can allow us to do that for the people we meet. We are able to be with them and allow them to be who they are with respect. We have that place inside of us where there's independence, a kind of freedom in the awareness that we're bigger. Just like the mind is more than its thoughts, the mind is more than how people are in the world.

From this bigger mind, this freer mind, we can give people the gift of letting them be just as they are, to respect them for what they are. If what they're doing is not skillful or kind, there is an art to letting that be, so that it hangs in the air and is seen clearly. We don't approve of it, but in awareness, we don't disapprove of it; we just let it be, poignant and clear. Allowing people to be helps them feel respected and known as they are—the good, the bad, the ugly—in a way that maybe allows them to move towards freedom, for them to grow.

May it be that through this practice we support the happiness, peace, and freedom of all beings through our ability to offer respect to each person, allowing them to be, to find their way to happiness and freedom, so that we are not interfering with that. May all beings be happy. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free.