--- ai_generation_date: '2026-10-14' ai_model: gemini-3-pro-preview ai_prompt_hash: 964013ba audiodharma: talks: - date: '2020-12-25' is_meditation: true mp3_url: https://audiodharma.us-east-1.linodeobjects.com/talks/12667/20201225-Gil_Fronsdal-IMC-guided_meditation_opening_to_joy.mp3 section_slug: guided-meditation-opening-to-joy speakers: - speaker_name: Gil Fronsdal speaker_url: https://www.audiodharma.org/speakers/1 talk_start_time_seconds: 0 title: 'Guided Meditation: Opening to Joy' url: https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/12667 video_unavailable: false collapsed_sections: [] location_city: Redwood City, CA video_unavailable: false youtube: id: GiQDg8qHi8I imprecise_upload_date: '2021-05-04' title: 'Guided Meditation: Opening to Joy' upload_date: null uploader_str: Insight Meditation Center uploader_url: https://www.youtube.com/@InsightMeditationCenter youtube_url: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiQDg8qHi8I --- # Guided Meditation: Opening to Joy - [Gil Fronsdal](https://www.audiodharma.org/speakers/1) _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._ ## Introduction So, Merry Christmas to all the Christians who are listening to this, and for all who are not Christian, I think it's a wonderful day to share in the joy that Christians feel today. It's a joyful day, and given that the theme is sharing and the joy of others, it seems like a wonderful day to share in that joy, and also to practice joy—to become someone who brings joy to the world. The Buddha said, "Cultivate what is wholesome. If it was not possible to cultivate the wholesome, I would not tell you to do so, but it is possible. So I tell you, cultivate the wholesome." And one of the wholesome qualities is joy. Buddhism is replete with all kinds of words for different types of joy. We have many words in English too, and they all fit different types of joy in the Dharma. There's delight, there's gladness, there's joy, there's happiness, there's rapture, ecstasy, and there is rejoicement. Rejoicement is my English translation for the word _muditā_[^1]. We're here this week practicing rejoicement, to rejoice in the joy and well-being of others. The ability to do so is intimately connected to our capacity for freedom—our ability to sit and be present. But not just be in the present moment; in being in the present moment, to discover how to have our hearts open, how to have our minds open, our hands open. How to live without closing down, clinging, or being caught up in preoccupations and thoughts. It's a radical thing to live in the present moment, free. We have this wonderful opportunity in meditation to explore this possibility and to learn about ourselves. We learn how we're not free, but not to be discouraged. That's really the way forward, to really see, "Oh, there I am preoccupied. There's where I'm caught. There's where I'm closed," and to have a certain gladness that we see it. That's half the way to freedom, to see how we're not free. We need to see it clearly, and to have a certain satisfaction at the ability to see, "Oh, this is how it is for me. This is what's going on for me." With time, this ability to see how it is can begin giving us a glimmer of freedom—the freedom of seeing clearly without being caught in what we see. ## [Guided Meditation: Opening to Joy](https://www.audiodharma.org/talks/12667) So, sit upright, either literally or figuratively, and gently close your eyes. Take a few moments to do nothing else but take stock of how you are right now. Check in with yourself, as if on this day you can be aware of how you are with a generosity, with a kind of very deep acceptance. Not an acceptance that gives in to anything, but the acceptance of the wise: "This is how it is. I'm this way now." Noticing how you are in your body, and maybe making small adjustments in your posture if it feels good for the body. Checking in with your heart: how are you feeling now? Accepting how it is, letting the heart be big enough to hold whatever is within it, however it is. Check in with yourself and how you are in your mind—the energies in the mind, the agitation, the spaciousness, the openness. And check in with yourself and how you are in your mindfulness. How you are as you check in—the checking-in-ness itself. The noticing of how you are, is that spacious and allowing? Or is it critical? Or is it eager or longing for something? Perhaps you can allow yourself to relax the knowing. Relax how you check in and regard yourself. Settling back, and perhaps gazing upon yourself with kind eyes. Gazing upon yourself and whatever is happening for you with kindness, with love, care. And then, whatever love or kindness you have, maybe that can go into how you're breathing. A kind regard for breathing. Maybe without even changing how you breathe, you can have a sense that you're breathing kindly. And on the exhale, perhaps kindly relax more deeply into your breathing. As you inhale, perhaps there's a way of opening the attention up widely in the body, as if your whole body receives the inhale. Whatever tingling, warmth, vibration, or flow of life that you feel in your whole body, it receives the inhale. It relaxes as you exhale. As you exhale, softening the mind, quieting the thinking, as if the mind has a chance to come home and to rest here in this body, in this heart. Noticing honestly any ways that you're preoccupied, any ways that you're being reactive to what is. Just noticing it clearly, seeing if the noticing can have a quality of freedom, simplicity. The knowing of preoccupation is independent of what it knows. Knowing allows the known to be known. There's a way in which knowing what is makes lots of space for what is. Looking upon all things kindly makes space for things to be, and in that space, there's more breathing room for breathing. Settling ever more into breathing, into the room that's around the breathing, the space within which you breathe. Let breathing move in and out of space. Without changing how you're breathing, can you appreciate your breathing? The full experience of breathing, however it is. This is how the body is breathing now. Experiencing the embodiment of breathing. Relaxing and resting into the embodied experience of breathing. And then as we continue, I would like to voice particular words, and as I say these words, see what responds in you—in your body, and your mind, and your heart. What resonates, what opens with these words: Joy. Delight. Gladness. Happiness. And to breathe now with whatever arose for you in these words. Breathe through it, breathe with it. And whatever it was wholesome that arose, let yourself give room for it, spread it through your body. And whatever was not wholesome or useful, maybe you can relax and let it go as you exhale. And with your own capacity for well-being as a reference, now turn your attention to others. How wonderful it would be if others could also experience well-being: joy, happiness, gladness, delight. And there are people who do experience this, and how wonderful it is that this is possible. Sharing in the joy of others, appreciating their capacity for joy. Let your joy, your well-being, your inspiration for it, be a light that spreads from you out into the world. Touching everyone with your wish for their joy, their continual joy. So that all beings may share in this field of goodness, of happiness, of joy. May your joy be shared with the world, with your good wishes and kind regard. Allow yourself to be still and gaze upon all things with delight, appreciation, with love. As if love and appreciation is the very best medicine for all beings. ## Aspiration And then to end this sitting with an aspiration: that on this day, you stay close to your deep appreciation of others. To really appreciate what is appreciable, and to rejoice in that, to share your happiness with that. Letting people know what you appreciate about them, in just the degree of appreciation that is comfortable for them to hear. Maybe just enough to lift their moods and bring a smile—that you appreciate maybe something that they haven't really appreciated about themselves. May we contribute to the joy and well-being of this world. May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe and healthy. And may all beings everywhere be free. --- [^1]: **Muditā:** A Pali word often translated as "sympathetic joy," or the joy in the good fortune and well-being of others.