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Guided Meditation: Receptive Awareness

Welcome everyone. We'll go ahead and start with the sitting, and today I'd like to offer a little bit of a guided meditation in what I sometimes call receptive awareness.

This is a style of practice where, rather than choosing what we attend to, such as picking an object like the breath or the body or hearing and allowing the attention to rest there, instead we settle back and receive what is already happening.

Mindfulness, as a factor of function in our minds, works both in conjunction with a directed attention—so we can choose to direct our attention and attend to something in particular like the breath—or we can essentially settle back and allow the processes of body and mind to choose what to attend to.

I sometimes give the analogy with receptive awareness that it's like the breath in a way. We can consciously choose to breathe. We can breathe in, say, "Okay, I'm going to breathe in," and we can breathe in. So we can control the breathing in that way; we can aim the attention and choose when to breathe in and when to breathe out. But we can also let go of that. We don't have to consciously remember to breathe; it will happen.

Mindfulness can function like that. Mindfulness does not require us to be choosing something in order to be mindful. This is something that I had to learn. I thought that if I wasn't choosing what to be mindful of, I was not being mindful. And so there's a learning process in terms of recognizing when we are mindful when we're not choosing the object of experience.

The guided meditation I'll offer will actually start with a little bit of directed attention to explore what it means to receive that experience instead of trying to look at anything about it. Then we'll broaden out to the place where we are simply settled back, letting go of choosing any particular object of experience, and just receiving.

Any form of meditation practice, and I think all forms of meditation practice, are supported by relaxation. So we'll start there, actually, with a little bit of guiding the attention through the body and exploring a relaxation of the body, and then we'll move into exploring the receptive awareness practice. We'll begin with some relaxation.

Checking into your body and seeing if there are places in the body that are holding tension, and seeing if there can be a relaxation of the body. It can be helpful to do this in a systematic way.

Perhaps starting with the head and face, seeing if the head and face can relax. Relaxing across the brow, around the eyes, the crown of the head, the back of the head, the jaw.

The neck and shoulders.

Seeing if perhaps the arms and hands can soften, relax.

Relaxing the chest and upper back, all those muscles around the rib cage. Sometimes as I notice this area and relax those muscles, very naturally a deeper breath happens. And that deeper breath can sometimes support even more relaxation of those muscles.

Relaxing the stomach, the muscles across the stomach in the abdomen, the middle and lower back.

Relaxing the hips, the legs, the feet.

And then sometimes it's also possible—it's not always available—but sometimes it's possible to explore a relaxation more deeply in the core of the body. So as I name some areas more deeply inside the body, just touch into those areas and see if there's an invitation, if the body is willing to accept the invitation to soften.

Maybe the inside of the throat can relax.

Maybe the heart can relax.

Maybe the stomach and the intestines can relax.

One of the benefits of the body relaxing is that it creates conditions that support the mind to be able to relax. So maybe, too, the mind can relax a little bit. Letting go of mental tension that might pull you into thoughts of past or future.

Sometimes Gil Fronsdal^[1] uses a lovely analogy about relaxing the mind. He says, as if the brain were a muscle, maybe the brain can relax.

From this place of whatever relaxation is available in this moment, exploring the possibility of receiving the breath. Letting the breath come to you. No need to see anything in detail or notice anything in particular about the breath. This breathing is happening. Awareness can receive that.

In a very light, simple way, settling back with the sense of not looking at or trying to find anything, but just willing to receive the breath however it is offered in this moment.

One of the basic instructions for mindfulness of breathing: Breathing in, know that you're breathing in. Aware of breathing in. Breathing out, know that you're breathing out. Simple instruction. Aware while breathing.

As we explore receiving the breath, there also may be other experiences that are revealed by awareness at the same time. While breathing, perhaps there's also awareness of a broader sense of the body. A relaxed body and mind support this kind of attention.

Perhaps, too, while aware of receiving the breath and maybe also some sense of the broader experience of the body, aware that hearing is happening. You've been possibly taking in the sound of my voice this whole time without effort, receiving.

Our system knows how to do this. We can perhaps settle back and allow awareness to receive naturally the breath, the body, and hearing.

If you're still connecting with the breath, that's fine. This kind of receptive awareness might allow that connection with the breath, but then also aware that other things are happening at the same time. Hearing and the breath. Body sensations and the breath. Perhaps even recognizing emotions or moods and the breath. Even thoughts can waft through, and the breath.

Allowing awareness to receive the human experience. The experiences of body and mind that are already happening right where you are.

You could explore, if you haven't already, letting go of any kind of attention or holding onto the thread that connects to the breath, and just explore receiving whatever is most obvious in this moment. That might be a body sensation, a particular sensation in the foot or hip or face. It might be a broader sense of body, a vibratory energy through the body. It might be hearing, the breath, or an emotion, a mood, a feeling.

With receptive awareness, we may find that the attention shifts from one experience to another. Sometimes slowly, sometimes as a flow—for a little while hanging out with the breath and body, and then attending to hearing, and back to the body. Sometimes it can feel like a flow of sensations and thoughts and feelings.

Other times it can happen more quickly. This shifting can feel almost jumpy, like the attention is rapidly shifting between experience, and that's okay. If that happens, sometimes it's settling back and just recognizing lots of changing things are happening. We don't have to track all the different things. Just exploring being aware and receiving experience.

And of course, the mind will wander. It will get lost. It will pick up on one of those things that the attention is drawn to. It'll start thinking about it. An image or a thought will arise in the mind and it will catch the attention, and we'll get lost.

And at some point, there will be a remembering. You'll remember. Possibly supported by sitting in silence with your eyes closed, hearing these words, you'll remember about being present again. In that moment, in the receptive awareness practice, there's nothing in particular to come back to. With receptive awareness, when awareness arises, when mindfulness returns, we open to what that experience is. First of all, what is it like for mindfulness to come back? Noticing that moment. It's a great moment. Awareness arises effortlessly in that moment. You didn't have to do it. That's a lovely reminder of what it's like to be aware without trying to be aware. Just awareness appearing.

And what is happening in that moment? What is awareness receiving in that moment? Often in that moment of a return from wandering, of the return from the mind being lost in thought, what's happening in that moment has been shaped by the thoughts that were happening. And so that's useful to be attentive to in that moment: what has been the impact, what has been the effect of thinking on your human system?

Sometimes if the mind has been wandering into charged thoughts—thoughts about things you have to do, or things that happened that had some challenge to them—what will have been shaped is a little bit of a response to those thoughts. Perhaps some of those emotions or feelings related to those things you need to do, or the things that happen that were charged. So that is useful to recognize. Just being with, receiving the body, receiving the moods, the emotions in that moment.

And perhaps, if it's supportive, remembering that relaxation supports our capacity to be mindful, to be aware.

Sometimes after the mind has wandered off into thought, the mind kind of drifts out of the present moment. It just picks up on some thought and it's drifting or floating. And then when we remember, we may not even really have a clear sense of what the thoughts were. They were more dreamlike or random thoughts. But what's the effect? What is the impact?

Sometimes I've found when the mind has drifted out of the present moment, if I'm not judging the mind for having gotten lost, that moment when mindfulness returns from that drifting, sometimes there's more ease, more relaxation, more spaciousness in the mind. More ease, more peace. That's useful to notice if that's what has happened after the mind has wandered. That ease, that peace can also be known, its effect on the body, the mind. And often there can be a sense of some pleasantness there that supports our willingness to be present.

And if it has been supporting you, after the mind wanders and you have explored this effect of the wandering on your experience, to receive the breath again, receive the body in a soft, gentle way that doesn't exclude other experience but has that perspective of and. Hearing and the breath. Body and the breath. Moods, emotions, and the breath.

Exploring receiving the human experience. With a perspective or an attitude of allowing. Allowing how you are to be just as you are. And sometimes if there's a resistance to what's happening, or wanting to hold onto something that's happening, that too is just another thing happening, and maybe that can be allowed. "There's this experience and there's resistance. Oh, that's what's happening." Can that be received? Allowing the non-allowing.

Being with your experience, moment after moment.

Aware While Thinking

Introduction

Kevin: Thank you for joining us today, Andrea. Andrea Fella is the co-teacher at the Insight Meditation Center and the Insight Retreat Center. She's been practicing insight meditation since 1996 and teaching insight meditation since 2003. She's particularly drawn to intensive retreat practice and has done a number of long retreats both in the United States and in Burma. During one long practice period in Burma, she ordained as a nun with Sayadaw U Janaka^[2]. Andrea is especially drawn to the wisdom teachings of the Buddha, and her teachings emphasize clarity and practicality. Andrea is a member of the Spirit Rock Teachers Council and teaches residential retreats for IMC and other retreat centers around the country. Welcome, Andrea.

Andrea: Thank you, Kevin. It's nice to be here and to see some faces in the Zoom room, some that I recognize. Hello everyone, and welcome to everyone who's streaming on YouTube. Nice to see all of you from around the world. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you are.

So today I thought to reflect on being aware while thinking.

We often in meditation practice have a conflict or a sense of struggle around thinking. If we're practicing a concentration practice, for instance, where we're attuning to a particular object of experience and trying to stay with that experience, then how we relate to thoughts in that case is we notice that we're thinking, we set aside the thought, we come back to the object. Or we might, if the thinking is strong, explore what's the impact of the thinking. We might look a little bit at the effect of thinking on the body, or the effect of thinking on our emotions. We rarely in meditation get many instructions about what it means to be aware while thinking.

We often in meditation are instructed: "Let go of the content of the thought. Let go of what's happening in the thought and turn to the experience that's happening." And so I just wanted to explore a little bit around this terrain of being aware while thinking, because it is a big part of our lives.

We use thoughts to navigate our world. And if we haven't explored or practiced, or even had the sense of the possibility that we can be mindful, aware while thinking, there are huge parts of our day that are off limits for mindfulness practice. If we think that while I'm thinking or engaged in something—even something quite active like writing an email or something like that—then there's a lot going on in our day that we won't be able to explore or connect with mindfulness.

Exploring Receptive Awareness

In the guided meditation, I offered an exploration of receptive awareness. This kind of awareness is, I find, very supportive, particularly in daily life practice. It is my main practice whether I'm in sitting meditation or in daily life. It's the same practice whether I'm in sitting meditation or in daily life; the instructions are the same: just receiving what's happening moment after moment, receiving and being aware of experience, noticing where the attention is drawn, including with thoughts.

One big difference, or one big place to be curious about, is what does it mean to be aware with the content of our thoughts? This is, again, in some of our more focused meditation practices, we don't generally engage with content; we're usually trying to drop below content and explore more the bare experience. But in navigating our lives, how content affects us is really a big part of where we get caught and lost, and a big part of how we struggle in our relationship to the ideas that come at us. The political ideas, a big place where we get caught in struggle. The relational experiences we get caught in: "I wanted my friend to do this, and they did this, and we respond." We have a lot of struggle around the content of our experience. Learning how to navigate this terrain—not saying, "Okay, content, drop the content and just come into the body," but what is it like to be aware with content?

A great place to begin this exploration is right in the meditation. As we explored in the guided meditation, when the mind wanders and returns from wandering, this is a place where we can begin exploring the effect of content on our experience.

In the guided meditation, I encouraged, after the mind had wandered, noticing what was present. Because when the mind wanders, it's wandering often into thought. It may be wandering into some charged thoughts, kind of active content of mind. It can wander into charged thoughts, or it can wander into more drifting thoughts. Those are two classes or categories of thinking that are useful to recognize the difference between.

The active kind of thinking often has a very strong effect on us when we're charging out to think about something. So when the mindfulness returns there, the experience of the present moment where mindfulness has returned will have been shaped by the content when we've gotten lost in it. If you've been thinking about a conversation you had with a partner or a co-worker that had some charged content, when your mindfulness returns, very likely that content will have shaped some of those same charged feelings. So this is a beginning place to recognize: "Okay, content affects experience." Those thoughts, when the mindfulness returns... often we know when the content is charged, often we are aware of the content as we come back. We know that we've been thinking about that conversation and what the content of that was. So we know that the content was there, and then how has that affected you?

This is a beginning way to, in that moment as mindfulness returns, be aware of the thought with the content, and how it affects you at the same time. This again is a more receptive or broader kind of awareness. You're not aiming at one particular area of experience trying to say, "Look at the body," or "See what the emotions are." It's more: "There's this thought that's been happening, receive the effect that it's had." And it may be a little bit in the body, a little bit in emotions; you may notice many things. So it's a broader receiving of what has happened, having had those thoughts.

With receptive awareness, continuing to notice what else is happening. You've noticed: "This has been the thought, here's how it's affected the body, the mind." After a certain period of exploring, "Oh wow, that's what happened," then something else might arise. You might hear the dogs start barking next door and the attention goes to that. That's fine. There's no place or object or thing particularly you need to come back to.

Now, in the place when you have returned from wandering, especially if the content has been charged, there can be a pull back to figure something out, or try to fix something, or figure out how to respond to that person. There may be some tension in the system. "What can I do?" Maybe you can notice that too. The feeling of those thoughts propelling the mind to want to do something. So notice the wanting, notice the desire to fix, to figure out, to control. That too can be known.

If at some point the pull to the thinking feels so strong that it's hard to resist, then it might be useful to come back to something where you land, like we started in the guided meditation. Land and receive the breath for a few moments. Receive the breath as a skillful means to support the mind remembering what it's like to be back in the present moment, and to support perhaps letting go of that pull to the thinking.

What I mean by the pull to thinking is the pull to thinking and not being mindful of it. If the thinking is happening and you can be aware, "Oh wow, the thought of wanting to do this, wanting to figure this out. Oh, and that's how this is affecting the body and mind. Oh, and this thought, what about that thing I could... oh, and there, that's how that's affecting the body and mind." That's not being pulled out of mindfulness. And so there's a learning here: what does it mean to be aware while we're thinking?

We so often have the view or the idea that if we are thinking, it means we're not being mindful. But this is where this kind of receptive awareness practice, which explores just being aware of whatever is happening, can potentially support us to recognize, "Well, I'm aware, I know that I'm thinking." And so awareness is here. We can be aware while thinking.

And in that being aware while thinking, it is often a little bit of a broader awareness. There's the awareness of the thought, the awareness of the content of the thought, and awareness of how that whole set of thoughts and ideas affects the system. So it's not a close-in or focused awareness; it's much broader. "There's these thoughts, and this is how I am with those thoughts."

Carol Wilson uses the phrase "360-degree mindfulness," which is a beautiful expression of taking in the experience. Not just thinking or seeing or hearing or body sensation, but the whole picture.

Sayadaw U Tejaniya^[3], one of the main teachers I've learned this practice of receptive awareness from, used a phrase "50/50 mindfulness." He said 50% of the attention on what you're doing, the content of what's happening, and 50% of the attention on how you are with that. So there's not the sense of the content being something outside of the mindfulness. The 360-degree awareness encapsulates that to some extent too. Aware of content, and how you are with that content. So that moment of remembering does begin to give a sense of what it might be like to be aware with content.

Active Thinking vs. Drifting Thinking

It can be useful to recognize different kinds of thinking. The active thinking, or the charged thinking, where the mind feels like it's just rushing out of the present moment, grabbing onto those thoughts and there's some energy to thinking about them. We can call that active thinking. And there's another kind of thinking where the mind just drifts out of the present moment. No particular emotional charge there, it's just like the mind picks up on something, it just floats out of the present moment. Often maybe a sense of random thoughts in that place, or hypnagogic thoughts, dreamlike thoughts can happen in that place. Just a drifting. They're very different in terms of the experience.

With the active thinking, it's useful to recognize the charge that happens. It may be useful in that situation to know there's the content, and recognizing the category of content—planning, remembering, fighting, judging, or fantasizing. If the content is really strong, not to say completely step out of the content, but let more of the attention be in the body and in the mind than in the content. Because the content may be the sticky place there, but staying connected with the content to some extent: "Oh, the mind is really caught in that plan, and wow, the mind is spinning with that plan."

When we return from active thinking, often the experience will have been shaped by the emotions, the thoughts, the content of that thinking. So often there will be some agitation that will have arisen. And that's a useful thing to check into.

Especially if you're exploring this in daily life. I'm talking about it more in the sitting meditation, but I'd like to also point to bringing this into daily life. In the sitting meditation we don't have as much to do, we're not potentially having to make a decision on the spot about something, so we can explore a little bit more, "Okay, there's these thoughts and here's how they're affecting the body and mind." In daily life, if you wake up into active thinking—you're walking down the street and suddenly you realize your mind has been pulled into this whole scenario—a useful exploration there can be just a simple check-in. So noticing, "Wow, the mind is caught and it's spinning," and just notice the agitation of body and mind that may be there. Just in a simple way. You don't have to do a detailed exploration.

Receptive awareness in daily life can take in a much broader kind of experience, the 360-degree awareness or the wide-angle lens. Mindfulness doesn't have to land on specific experience, it can be much broader. And so in the awareness of thinking in our daily lives, just notice, "Oh, this is what's happening."

Awareness of Content in Daily Life

Yesterday I was taking a walk, and I was noticing some thoughts about not wanting to be taking the walk. I was noticing that I was tired, and I know that when I'm tired it's actually a really good time to take a walk, but there was resistance to taking the walk. And so I was noticing the thoughts about that. What I noticed is that sometimes the mind would get a little caught in it, a little tight, and it felt like there was a squeezing in the mind. So that was a simple kind of piece: just this feeling of squeezing. And then noticing those thoughts, I just hung out with them. I wasn't saying, "Oh, let go of that squeezing." It's like, "Oh, the mind is squeezing with this thought."

And then in being with it, after a few moments the squeezing would let go and it'd be like, "Oh yeah, not wanting to take this walk. And yeah, it's okay, just not wanting to do this is happening." But there's not the extra resistance, the trying to get out of the walk while I'm walking. And so just the way the mind works. The mind could see that squeezing and just like, "Oh yeah, wow, look at how hard the mind does not want to be here." And then it would release, and then it would come back. And I just watched this process multiple times. I'd say maybe ten minutes into the walk, the mind had finally let go of those thoughts of, "I don't want to be doing this," and it was just fine to be walking.

I could have powered through the walk in any case, kind of repressed all of those thoughts and just powered through the walk, which is what I used to do. But then the mind is reinforcing the aversion, it's reinforcing those thoughts of, "If I just bear down and get this over with, it'll be okay." It's reinforcing that, "Oh look, I bore down and I got through this and here I am done with the walk, that really worked." But you can get done with the walk without bearing down and forcing it too. So just to explore the possibility of being aware with the thoughts, as opposed to the idea, "I need to get rid of the thoughts in order to be okay." Just aware of those thoughts, aware while thinking.

There's a lot that we can see in this terrain. Especially in the sitting practice, when we explore being aware while thinking, noticing thoughts arising, we can start to see how those thoughts are conditioned. We can see a thought will often arise based on something that has happened. We hear a sound, we have a perception. We hear a bird outside, and then we perhaps recognize the kind of bird: "Oh, that's a crow." And then we see an image, perhaps we even see an image of the crow and imagine what the crow is doing, and then we start thinking about crows. We start thinking about the crows in our backyard and what they do there, and then the mind gets lost.

That's a very habitual way for our mind to get lost, but we can actually be aware of how that all happens, and notice that it is conditioned. How a perception will create a memory, we'll think about that memory, and then perhaps that memory can create emotions. So all of that arising from a perception leading to thought, we can stay present for the process.

And sometimes as we stay present for the process, very naturally what happens is—this is kind of funny and paradoxical—but very naturally what happens is, as we attend to the process of thinking, the process of thinking begins to diminish. We see the thought, we see the perception of crow, we see the thought of crow, we see the mind start thinking about crows, we feel an emotion, and we recognize, "Oh yeah, this is all a conditioned process." And with the awareness, instead of then launching into the emotions and further thoughts that are spurred from that emotion, the whole thing can sometimes fall away.

And so in a paradoxical way, being able to learn how to be aware while thinking helps the mind to engage less with reactive thinking, to engage less with unnecessary thinking. This is something I've seen happening a lot in my life around the mind just going off into random thinking. Because I'm much more present, there's a lot more of a sense that the thinking that happens more is the kind of thinking that's useful. "What do I need to do today? How do I need to do it? What would I like to bring to this? What kind of attitudes or mind states would I like to bring to what I need to do today? Can I be kind today with what I need to do? Can I recognize when I'm caught in reactivity?"

Practicing with Reading and Writing

Another way, especially in daily life, to begin to explore this terrain of being aware with content—because this again is a huge place where we tend to lose mindfulness or just not think it's possible to be mindful—is to slow it down a little bit. Thoughts happen pretty fast. Thoughts are pretty quick-moving, and so it's not always that easy to catch thoughts and to be aware while thinking. It is possible, and the more we practice with it, the more possible it becomes. But to practice with the content of our thoughts, often at first we do notice that we're thinking and then how does it affect us. So it's a little bit of that back and forth. We can do the same thing in daily life around content, and a great place to explore this is with reading and writing.

With reading, essentially you're taking in the content of someone else's mind, unless you're reading your own stuff, in which case you're taking in the contents of your prior self's mind. So you're taking in content. How does that content affect you when you read? With reading, you can slow it down, and I play with this sometimes, especially in reading the news. Read a headline: how does that land? Take in the content: how does that content affect the system?

Words are so powerful for us. A single word can shape your experience. A single word can have an effect on your experience. And so reading a headline, multiple words with the concept embedded in that, can have a very powerful effect on your experience. So become aware of that. Read a headline: how does that land? Slow it down with reading. Read a couple of sentences, read a paragraph, pause. This might take a remembering. Perhaps you could, if you do your news reading online, put a little reminder to yourself somewhere to try to practice with this. Help yourself remember to do this. What does it mean? How does this content affect the body, the mind? Read a few paragraphs, check in. Read some more, check in.

Notice if you start getting charged. Perhaps if you start getting charged, and the mind starts picking up and running out of the present moment, justifying your position, denying somebody else's position, maybe that's a time to really let yourself settle in again. It's like, "Okay, wow, really charged right now. This is what it feels like to be charged."

With writing we can also slow that down some. With writing you are investigating or looking at the content, you're trying to share the content of your mind with somebody else or with yourself, so it's more aligned with or more like thinking in a way. It's a slowed-down thinking process to put things down in writing. And so you can explore this also. Maybe have a practice of, while writing a text or an email or a tweet: how does it feel? How is this content, these thoughts affecting this system? Is there agitation or is there ease while creating this content? That simple check: is there agitation or ease with this content? Hugely helpful. It can be that simple. You don't have to know the details of what the kind of emotion is, just like: is there energy like this, or is the energy like this? Recognizing that with the content that you are thinking of sharing.

Potentially also, this is a way into exploring being mindful while speaking as well. You might also reflect before you send that text or tweet or email: how might the person who is the audience receive it? It's almost like in that moment putting yourself in their shoes, feeling like the recipient of it. How does that land if you were to receive this communication? Again, using mindfulness with content.

Drifting Thoughts and Modalities of Thinking

With drifting thinking, it has been a wonderful practice for me, it's been delightful actually. What in my own experience I've seen is often that kind of thinking comes where the mind just drifts out of the present moment. There's some settledness of mind, because the mind isn't picking up on its habits, its tendencies, it's just floating. And when it gets into that kind of floaty space, sometimes we just lose touch with remembering to be mindful there. And so that floating quality, when we find ourselves having floated out of the present moment and waking back up into that, what I've seen often is the recognition of the content of thoughts there is usually not that relevant. What the content of those thoughts is, is often random or dreamlike or nonsensical, and so the content isn't as much to work with there, as it is potentially recognizing how you've noticed those thoughts.

There are different modalities that we can think in. We can think in images, we can think as if we're talking to ourselves, we can think as if we're hearing somebody else talk to us. So hearing and seeing are two of the big ways most of us think, through an internal sense of hearing or seeing. We can also think through any of the sense bases. We can think as though we were in a kinesthetic way. When I was a dancer, I would often play the dance through in my mind. And so it's a form of thought. As if I were doing it, and I would feel it in my body. That's how I would think through the dance. So there's that possibility of thinking kinesthetically.

As an example of that, maybe right now if you're sitting down, you could just explore imagining standing up. Is there just a little bit of a sense of, in the body, some kind of sense of that experience? Sometimes you can experience that or recognize that, sometimes not. That's maybe a little pointer to what it's like to have that kinesthetic thinking.

We can think in these multiple ways. And so with the drifting thinking, it can be useful to recognize, how was that thinking happening? Images, words? And then we can start to recognize, instead of being caught by those images or thoughts, sounds in the mind, we can recognize, "Oh, the mind has got these images going." And again we don't have to stop them. It was so interesting to me when I learned this on a retreat, to just see the mind will put up these... it's like a slideshow. I was thinking about being in Prague when I was traveling in Czechoslovakia, and I get these images, these still images of various places I was, and it lasted for like five, ten seconds, and then it stopped. And I was present for the entire slideshow. It was quite a delightful experience actually, remembering that experience. There was a little bit of the flavor of having been there, but because I was present, the mind didn't pick up on those thoughts and then go off into being in Prague for 15 minutes. It lasted for about 10 seconds and then it went on. Aware while thinking, aware of this process of thinking. So those drifting kind of thoughts, sometimes useful to recognize how they are experienced, the modality in which they are experienced.

If the mind does drift out of the present moment and gets lost in the wandering, then that moment of returning... as I expressed in the guided meditation again, sometimes if the mind has drifted out of the present moment, when we wake up, when our mindfulness returns from that drifting, if we do not have the attitude or the idea or the agenda that the thinking was a problem—it's just like, "Oh, mindfulness is back, what's happening in this moment?"—if we don't have any sense of it having been a problem for the mind to be drifting and not mindful, then what often happens after a drifting is that the mind is actually more at ease and more relaxed than it was before the mind drifted.

This was a huge help for me. I was definitely an over-striver, really hanging on to that mindfulness, trying to stay present moment after moment, doing the practice so hard, so much attachment to the practice. And as I began to be curious about this moment when mindfulness returns, and seeing the mind returning from the drifting, it was almost like what it felt like the mind was doing was telling me, "You're working too hard, here I'll show you how to relax." And if I was available for that lesson when the mindfulness came back, it was like, "Oh, this is what it's like to be mindful and at ease at the same time. This is what it's like to be relaxed while being aware." And so that exploration around the drifting mind can be really enlightening. It can be really supportive for helping the mind recognize what it means to be at ease with mindfulness.

Q&A

Kevin: We'll give people some time to raise their hand or put questions in chat on YouTube. Or if you feel like it, you can put your questions in chat in Zoom as well, and we'll take them there. Hey, Tom and Dana, if you guys want to come off mute and ask a question, we can go ahead.

Tom/Dana: Hi, Andrea.

Andrea: Hi.

Tom/Dana: When I'm aware of my thoughts and the breath, I also am aware of this base note of anxiety. So there are three things cooking. What should I do? [Laughter]

Andrea: You could explore it by just knowing all of it. So there's the breath, the thought, and the base anxiety. You could just explore, "Wow, that's what's happening," you know, just like, "Okay, yes." And is the content of the thought kind of connected with that anxiety, or is it something else? Because sometimes the thoughts are popping out of the base of our emotional terrain, and sometimes they create our emotional terrain. It's conditioned both ways. And so be curious about, well, what's the relationship between those thoughts and the anxiety?

If the anxiety feels strong, then it's possible that with the mindfulness of it, the attention might gravitate towards that side of the experience. In being aware while thinking, we don't have to preference the content. It's like with receptive awareness, it's more, "Wow, I become aware: the breath, the thought, the anxiety. What's most obvious here?" What's most obvious, and where does the attention feel like it's most drawn to? With a receptive awareness, it's more like we don't have to decide where we direct the attention. It's more like, "Can I allow this to be as it is, and what is most wanting attention right now?" If the mindfulness can hold that.

If the mindfulness doesn't get lost while holding that. So if there can be an allowing sense of, "Oh yeah, this is what's happening, and that anxiety is there, these thoughts are there, here's the breath." If the mindfulness can hold that kind of a patience and a trust that there is learning that's happening. But if you find that the attention is drawn into the anxiety and starts thinking more thoughts, then it could be useful to direct the attention to something where you can stay present. Maybe with the breath, for instance, or if the breath feels tied up with the anxiety, maybe with hearing. So that there's some skillful means. If it feels like the mind is pulled into the thinking and it can't not go there, then it's useful to do some directed attention to something that allows you to stay present.

But from what you described, it sounds like there's some capacity to just know all of that. So some of it is trust, trust that there is learning happening here. We like to be in charge of the learning, we like to know what we're learning. Sometimes we don't get to know that. The Buddha talked about the practice being very gradual. Moment after moment the mindfulness just meets experience, and he speaks about the wearing away of the reactivity being like the wearing away of the rigging of a ship that's held up on dry land after being at sea for six months. Just like the sun, the sand, the wind kind of wears away the rigging, and after six months it's going to be more worn, after two years it'll be broken and rotted through. And so the mindfulness functions like that. Moment after moment, minute after minute, hour after hour, even day after day. We may not see what's being let go or what's being worn down. And so some patience and some trust that the practice of being aware is enough. Being aware with the quality of mind that is allowing it to be as it is.

And that exploration of knowing what that experience is, where the mind can be present and not pulled into... that's the crucial piece. Be curious about "What is this experience?" When there can be that curiosity, the learning will naturally unfold there.

So thank you for the question. And I'm sorry for the rest of you who put in questions, it's time. So thank you all for your practice, and may the benefits of our practice together be shared with all beings everywhere. May all beings be healthy, happy, safe, and at ease. May all beings know peace. Thank you all.