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Guided Meditation: Deep Relaxation

So, warm greetings, and welcome to our meditation together.

Those of you who come regularly know that I almost always begin a guided meditation by spending some time relaxing the body. Some people might think of this as a beginner's meditation, before we get into something more profound. In a similar vein, some people think meditation done for stress reduction is also not very profound, and that there are great religious profundities to discover instead. Maybe that's true.

But what's also true is that what we learn in relaxing—with the activity of relaxing—is just what gets more thorough and bigger as we go along the path of Buddhism, until we come to awakening, release, or nirvana^[2], which is the big relaxation. It's a big letting go of the holding, the tension, the grasping, and the stress. So I think rather than looking at relaxing at the beginning as just a beginning practice, or something we do before getting into something more serious, it's really about beginning to lubricate the body, letting it become familiar with something that is going to keep happening deeper and deeper. This releasing, relaxing, and letting go.

What helps with that is as you relax at the beginning, to whatever degree you're able—even if it's just a teeny-tiny bit—feel the goodness of that. Feel the benefit of that; feel how nice it is. Let it register. Allow yourself to feel it. In other words, feel the influence that relaxation has on your body, your mind, and your heart. As this goes along, the relaxation will help you relax deeper. A surface relaxation sets up the conditions for a deeper relaxation, and then deeper relaxation, until we get down to the very core of our being, where something there can release and relax as well. And then we're free. So we'll start now and do some of this relaxation.

One of the reasons to assume a balanced, aligned posture—if you can, to sit upright, but if you're laying down to be careful with that posture as well—is because it allows for relaxation. If you're new to meditation, sometimes you feel the work of sitting upright, but after a while, the muscles get stronger and the body adapts to it. Sitting upright in a certain meditative way allows for some of the deepest physical relaxation that the body is able to do. They say the corpse posture—laying on your back—is equal in how deeply one can relax. We can relax deeper if we're not hunched over and collapsed in the chest.

So gently closing the eyes.

As if your whole body is participating in a deep inhale, breathe in deeply so that your torso expands in all directions. The ribcage in the front goes out, the ribcage in the back expands a little bit, and the shoulders are maybe lifted up a bit. If your stomach is relaxed as you breathe in, you might even feel a pushing down. Take deep breaths and feel the fullness of the whole torso participating.

Then, a long, slow exhale. The whole torso relaxes and settles back.

Taking a deep breath in. And then relaxing as you exhale.

And then letting your breathing return to normal.

As you exhale a normal exhale, relax the muscles of your face, around the eyes, the jaws, the cheeks.

Exhale, relaxing the shoulders. Whatever relaxation you can feel, let the influence of that relaxation spread through your body.

As you exhale, relaxing or softening in the shoulders. Maybe a releasing in the shoulders.

As you exhale, relaxing in the chest, around the heart, the solar plexus, the diaphragm.

And relaxing the belly.

It's helpful if the whole body participates in this, so you might look and see if you can relax your arms and hands. Maybe a subtle release of tension, of holding.

Releasing, relaxing the legs. The muscles of the calves, the thighs.

And then perhaps there's a global relaxation you can do for the whole body. As you release or soften the body more broadly, let that be felt deep inside.

Also, relax wherever your center of thinking is. Whatever tension, contraction, or pressure that's associated with thinking. As you exhale, relaxing the thinking muscle. Gently quieting the mind.

It's possible to go deeper inside. If you feel and sense deep in the center of your being, maybe there is a holding, resistance, or tension. Maybe a chronic one. Take a few moments to breathe with it, breathe through it. And as you exhale, relax and release the center of your being.

There may be a little bit of tension around breathing itself. Don't worry about that tension. Make room for it, breathe with it, as if it's okay. Maybe at the end of the exhale, you can relax a bit of it. If there's a pause at the end of the exhale, even if it's infinitesimally short, see if you can be very relaxed so you can receive the inhale. Allow it to arise.

Deeper in your mind than your thinking, there can be a very subtle pressure, contraction, or coagulation around self—around the doer or the experiencer. Around the one who's responsible or the one who's scared. Perhaps you can allow whatever other relaxation you've done so far to be there to support and receive the deep relaxation of this tension around self.

Chances are, in any ways in which you are taken away from the present moment in thoughts or feelings, there's some tension related to that. If there is, see if you can relax that tension.

And then, as we come to the end of the sitting...

We relate to others in the world, and to the world itself, very differently if we relate to it through our tension and the ways in which we're contracted, than if we are relaxed, loose, and expansive.

Imagine that sitting in front of you is a friend—someone you care for, an uncomplicated friend. Imagine yourself relaxed and peaceful, safe and contented, where nothing needs to happen. You don't have to do anything or say anything in particular. Maybe your friend is reading a book peacefully, and you can just sit together with your friend in your relaxed state.

Perhaps there's room there for your feelings of friendliness, your feelings of appreciation, maybe feelings of love or kindness. Relaxing deeply into and with your feelings of friendship for your friend.

Perhaps it's fairly simple then to relate to your friend more from kindness than from hostility, complaining, or resentment. More from goodwill than ill will. More from generosity than from greed.

And then, with whatever feelings you have for your friend, maybe those can be extended outward in a simple way. Out into the world, with goodwill for others.

The deeper and fuller our relaxation is, the more space there is for friendliness, kindness, and care. Tension makes us claustrophobic and fills the space of awareness. Relaxation opens that space so that our wholesome feelings for others can exist there.

May all beings be happy. May all beings be safe. May all beings be peaceful. May all beings be free. And may we, in whatever way that is easy and appropriate for us, contribute to that possibility.

Dharmette: Kusala (4 of 10) The Roots of the Unwholesome: Greed, Hatred and Delusion

I will continue the topic of the wholesome and unwholesome, a fundamental concept for the entire teachings of the Buddha. The focus today will be more on the unwholesome; next week will be more on the wholesome.

The unwholesome is said to have three roots, and these roots are greed, hatred, and delusion. The idea of roots is very interesting. The root of a plant is underground and you can't see it. But for some plants, if you chop them off at the surface level, the roots are still alive in the ground, and the plant will still sprout and grow again from those roots. Sometimes plants die back and are not visibly seen above the ground at all, but then spring comes, the rainy season arrives, and they start growing again, and there they are.

Sometimes greed, hatred, and delusion, as roots, are called latent tendencies^[3]. They may lay inside of us latently, ready to sprout whenever the conditions are right. Some people might feel that they have no greed, hatred, or delusion because they don't see it in themselves, but then at some point, the conditions come together and, boy, is it ever there.

There's a story in the suttas^[4]—maybe I told you this, I don't think I told you last week, but I was thinking of it—of a woman who was always kind. But someone said maybe this is only surface deep. So someone challenged her in a simple way, and sure enough, she got angry and even violent. This illustrates the idea of latent roots—the roots deep inside, like greed, hatred, and delusion.

Dharma^[5] teachers like me will repeat this phrase "greed, hatred, and delusion" a lot. When I was a younger student, I heard it so often, and I think part of my brain just kind of checked out. I heard it so repetitively, so by rote, that it was almost like I didn't hear it anymore because it was emphasized so much. But the reason it's emphasized is because it's the truth: these are the roots deep inside that give birth to all kinds of unwholesome behavior.

I find it very compassionate to call it "unwholesome" behavior as opposed to bad, evil, or wrong behavior. There are a lot of judgments around some of the ways we understand people's behavior. "Unwholesome" means that you can change it into something wholesome. Wholesome refers more to the quality of the activity, and doesn't necessarily judge the person.

Some behavior is unwholesome, and it springs from these three roots. Inside of ourselves—unseen many times—can live a source from which unhelpful, unbeneficial behavior arises. In the simplest kind of way, it's related to tension, to holding, to places we feel hurt. Places where we've coagulated or condensed around our pain, our sadness, or conceit—all kinds of things we're holding on to. That can be very deep, subliminal, and not even seen. These tensions feel latent, but they're ready to express themselves in all kinds of ways.

Part of this practice of the Dharma is to really reach down into the roots of our very being—not just the places that we can see and know, but deep inside, from which unwholesome behavior springs. These deep holding patterns and tensions inside. For that, the process of relaxing, feeling safer and safer, relaxing deeper and deeper, and releasing until we touch these places that are usually not seen, where the roots are deep inside, is essential.

When we pull the root of a plant out of the ground, the plant doesn't sprout again. So we have these ideas of the three roots of greed, hatred, and delusion. I think of these as umbrella terms for a whole family of related motivations, feelings, or attitudes. In the ancient texts, they provide synonyms or words for some of the other elements of that family.

Greed is related to lust, relishing (which is enjoying but holding on and really wanting more, squeezing the most out of it), longing, attachment, clinging, and craving. These are all in the family of greed, and when we say greed, we include all of these within it. Where do those surface from? What's the root of those inside of you when you feel greed, lust, deep longing, attachment, clinging, or craving? To respect these in a beneficial way is to respect their power and the influence they have on us. What are they arising out of? What's the deeper disposition from which they come? What's the deeper feeling tone? What's the deeper tension that we carry with us from where they arise?

Hatred has synonyms like wanting to harm, anger, and hostility. Anger is a little bit confusing as a word, because not all anger involves wanting to harm. But in this Buddhist list, it all has to do with wanting to harm. So, hostility, wrath, malice, and obstructing. One word is "irritation," but the question is: how does irritation mean causing harm? Some kind of ill will is there as part of it.

Delusion is ignorance, bewilderment, foolishness, and interestingly, not knowing—not really understanding suffering. If we don't understand our suffering in some deep way, and see how it arises and how it ceases, we don't really understand it. Suffering not understood is a source for delusion, and that then gets expressed often in greed, hatred, and ill will.

These have a wide influence on us. What's interesting in the Buddhist analysis of human behavior is that all unwholesome behavior—all behavior which is harmful in some ways to ourselves or to others—has its root in these three forces inside of us. If these are the roots, then the task is to somehow get sensitive enough, still enough, and comfortable enough in oneself—to feel a certain security in oneself—to really be quiet and touch those roots. To really feel what is subliminal, what's often latent.

One of the avenues to do that is physical: to feel the physical tension with a heightened sense of mindfulness. To really tune in deeply to the subtlest forms of tension that sometimes are only felt if the surface tension is finally relaxed enough. Even after a long period of peace and ease, we might get a sense, "Oh, look at that. There's a little tightening, a contraction, a little kernel of tightness or pressure." Then, we can help that soften and relax, and let that release.

Even though it might feel like a small, little kernel, subtle and deep inside, it's often the very seed. Just like the seed of a redwood tree is quite small but the tree grows really big. In the same way, these little seeds deep inside of greed, hate, and delusion might seem inconsequential because they're so small. But in deep, quiet meditation, that's the place where sometimes we can touch those roots or seeds and let them relax and release.

Since all unwholesome behavior comes from these, it becomes really useful to address them, to meet them, and to understand them. One of the practices in Buddhism is to recognize greed, hatred, and delusion when they arise. Sometimes those words are so big they seem like they represent obvious movements of greed and hatred that everyone can see. But the tendency in Buddhism is to see even the very subtle movements. As mentioned, one synonym or connection to hatred is irritation. Attachment can be very small, very mild.

Any movement like that where there's a kind of self-harm, or any chronic holding or tightening we have, creates unhelpful conditions for us. As we relax and soften that, we create conditions for something very positive: the opposite of greed, hatred, and delusion. Those also can be roots—the roots of non-greed, non-hatred, and non-delusion. For these to be the source from which we operate is a whole sea change in how we can live our lives. That also is discovered by deeply relaxing. Those seeds are waiting for us, and they also grow into big redwood trees and become strong.

So greed, hatred, and delusion. One of the goals is to become sensitive to them so that we are not pushed around by them, or caught in bondage to their influence.

Thank you. I offer these words and thoughts about these deep roots inside of us with tremendous respect for your depth and care for your roots. I really wish that in that depth of who you are, you can find peace, well-being, love, and freedom, and that something deep inside can release and let go. So, thank you.