Tara Brach

Given how our biases create separation and unfold into violence and suffering, this is a crucial domain for each of us to explore. In this interview, author and teacher Anurag Gupta offers his wise perspectives and invites Tara to share some of what she has learned in navigating this terrain. We explore how to come into a healing relationship with unhealthy thoughts; forgiving ourselves for bias (it's impersonal); the inner freedom that arises from releasing bias and how to awaken compassion and deep respect for those we have habitually dehumanized. The interview closes with Tara leading a brief reflection on undoing bias.

Anu's recent book is: Breaking Bias: Where Stereotypes and Prejudices Come From - and the Science-backed Method to Unravel Them. You can pick up your copy here: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/760282/breaking-bias-by-anu-gupta/ or on Anu's website at: https://www.bemorewithanu.com.

Collecting, unifying and opening the mind, we begin with a listening attention, noticing sounds that are here. Relaxing open and letting sounds wash through. With the same receptivity to sounds, listen to and feel the aliveness of the body. Listening to the breath as if you're listening to the voice of a quiet loved one – really close in, tender attention – and including the background sounds. Not pushing away anything – a very open and relaxed, receptive attention.

Sensing what's actually happening in this moment – perhaps the sensations of the breath, the other sensations through the body, the play of light and dark in the eyes, sounds… Closing by sensing all in the foreground and in the background – that alert inner stillness, that light of awareness, that which is our deepest, formless nature.

Happiness and freedom arise as we include all parts of our being in a loving awareness. In this talk we explore how this inner work of inclusion is the grounds of democracy, and how it enables us to participate in our relationships and society in a way that fosters communications, belonging and realization of the greater good.

Starting with scanning through the body and awakening the senses, we then rest in presence, with the breath as a home base. The meditation invites an openness to whatever arises, and a gentle kind attention if we encounter physical or emotional pain. We end with a prayer that includes our own being and all beings.

In this conversation, Tara Brach and Gabor Maté come together to explore the heart-wrenching situation in Gaza through the lens of the Bodhisattva path. Drawing from the Bodhisattva path - the commitment to alleviate suffering for all beings - they explore the importance of compassion and engaged spirituality in responding to the oppression and trauma experienced by the Palestinian and Israeli people.

This conversation is an invitation to examine our own spiritual practices and to consider how we can embody the Bodhisattva spirit in today's world, breaking the silence and standing in solidarity with all who are suffering. It was offered as part of a series of conversations that accompany a poignant and heartbreaking film - "Where Olive Trees Weep" - about the struggles and resilience of Palestinian people under Israeli occupation. whereolivetreesweep.com

This guided meditation offers a pathway to quieting our mind and calming anxiety. We begin with long deep breathing, and with the breath, engage the image of a smile and relax through the body. Then we practice resting in relaxed awareness, allowing waves of thoughts, feelings and sensations to come and go.

The meditation ends with a beautiful verse from poet Philip Booth:

As you float now, where I held you and let go, remember when fear cramps your heart what I told you: lie gently and wide to the light-year stars, lie back, and the sea will hold you.

Poem: First Lesson," by Philip Booth from Lifelines: Selected Poems 1950-1999 (Viking).

This talk continues the exploration of what causes our distrust of ourselves, others and life, and the pathways to realizing and trusting who we are. We explore the steps of awakening from limiting beliefs, dissolving the resistance to direct embodied presence, and discovering the space and tenderness – the formless dimension – that is indivisible and whole.

This meditation includes a full body scan, and then opens the senses to all experience, allowing life to be just as it is. The training is a relaxing back, noticing the sounds that are here, feeling the aliveness of the body sitting here. We call on the two wings of wakefulness and openness, noticing what's happening moment-to-moment with a kind, allowing attention.

We rest and relax back, discovering the presence that's here – our senses awake… in wide open awareness… awake, relaxed, open.

One of the expressions of an awakened heart-mind is a basic trust in reality. These talks explore the severed belonging that gives rise to mistrust, and two primary pathways to realizing and trusting the indivisible field of loving awareness that is our source (a favorite from the archives).

By not resisting, by letting the waves wash through us, we begin to relax. Rather than fighting the stormy surges, we rest in an ocean of awareness that embraces all the moving waves. We arrive in a sanctuary that feels large enough to hold whatever is going on.

Desire is intrinsic to all living forms – the urge to exist and flourish. It turns to suffering when, due to unmet needs, it contracts, intensifies and separates us from our full aliveness and awareness. These two talks guide us in awakening from this trance, and discovering how within desire is the longing that can carry us to true belonging.

"All you need is already within you, only you must approach yourself with reverence and love. Self-condemnation and self-distrust are grievous errors. Your constant flight from pain and search for pleasure is a sign of the love you bear for yourself. All I plead with you is this – make love of yourself perfect. Deny yourself nothing. Give yourself infinity and eternity and discover you do not need them. You are beyond." ~ Sri Nisargadatta

This meditation guides us through a relaxing body scan and then explores how we can allow the breath to calm our body and bring peace to our heart.

Desire is intrinsic to all living forms – the urge to exist and flourish. It turns to suffering when, due to unmet needs, it contracts, intensifies and separates us from our full aliveness and awareness. These two talks guide us in awakening from this trance, and discovering how within desire is the longing that can carry us to true belonging.

When our hearts open to the life that is here, just as it is, we discover vast loving presence. This meditation engages the smile as we scan through and awaken to our body and senses. Then we practice meeting the changing flow of life with a full allowing, wakeful and open awareness. We close with a verse from e.e. cummings.

One expression of suffering is forgetting that we are intrinsically lovable and worthy. This talk looks at the pathway to trusting our belonging, and focuses on the healing that comes from letting in love and mirroring others goodness.

Talk includes quotes from Henri Nouwen, The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming

This practice uses the image and felt sense of a smile as we scan through the body, include sound and relax back into the awareness that is the source of all experience. By letting life be just as it is, we become pure living presence – wakeful, open and tender.

Our human loneliness and suffering arise from getting identified in a mental ego, and separating ourselves from the living web of our natural world. This talk explores the pathway back to sacred relationship, and offers reflections and practices that awaken intimacy with the non-human world.

This guided meditation includes a full body scan, and the recognition of the formless awareness that includes and is the source of all experience. By recognizing that awareness we discover the silence and stillness that is the ground of all experience.

If we are suffering, we are believing an interpretation of reality that is limiting and untrue. At these times we are imprisoned in a painful looping of fear-driven thoughts and feelings. This talk explores the ways our practices of mindfulness, compassion and loving presence can guide us from addictive thinking to perceiving life with a wise heart.

This guided practice awakens all the senses with an embodied presence, allowing an opening to the moment-to-moment changing flow of experience. We then relax back, resting as the changeless open awareness that is conscious of the flow, and includes all life.

In describing our human predicament and dis-ease, D.H. Lawrence says we are like a great tree with our roots in the air. We need to replant ourselves—in our bodies, hearts and spirit. These two talks are guides to replanting ourselves. In Part 1, we explore how we are so often dissociated from the life of our body, and the pathways home. Part 2 looks at the challenges of pain, fear and trauma, and how we can gradually and skillfully reconnect with a wholeness of being.

The receptivity of listening awakens us to the living stream of life. This meditation guides us in listening to sounds, and then listening to and feeling the aliveness of our bodies and the movement of the breath. We close with a simple offering of lovingkindness to our inner life and our world.

In describing our human predicament and dis-ease, D.H. Lawrence says we are like a great tree with our roots in the air. We need to replant ourselves—in our bodies, hearts and spirit. These two talks are guides to replanting ourselves. In Part 1, we explore how we are so often dissociated from the life of our body, and the pathways home. Part 2 looks at the challenges of pain, fear and trauma, and how we can gradually and skillfully reconnect with a wholeness of being.

This meditation includes a full body scan, and then opens the senses to all experience, allowing life to be just as it is. Awakening to the life of our body reveals the mysterious formless presence that is our source. We close with a poem from Danna Faulds.

Our being has many frequencies of aliveness and as we attend to the more subtle, we discover a portal to the radiant awareness that is always here. This meditation guides us in using the breath and attention as we scan through the body and awaken an inner luminosity. We then open the attention to rest in the whole field of awake awareness.

The focus of this conversation is on our relationships with dogs, and more broadly, all beings. We look at what Thich Nhat Hanh called interbeing, and what happens when we shift our attention from self to who are we together.

Tara is joined by Mark Drucker, an animal lover who works in digital media and is founder of lovedog.com, and Drew Webster, a dog behavior consultant par excellence.

In this recording, Tara is being interviewed for their podcast and found herself deeply impacted by the conversation. She reports that she and her 6-month-old pup, Niki, play more. Her attention has deepened and she is more awake in their relationship, and of course that extends out to the world of relationships.

So whether you have a dog, cat, favorite tree, or human to practice on, bringing attention to interbeing means more belonging, aliveness, and love. lovedog.com

Martin Luther King's term, "Beloved Community," points to our potential for living together with love, justice and respect. This talk explores the often hidden expressions of racism that fuel separation and violence, and pathways toward healing and freeing our collective hearts.

NOTE: At the same time as the tragic killings in Charleston, SC, Tara's Wednesday night class was reflecting on racism and the aspiration for Beloved Community. "May we awaken our hearts from the prison of separation; may we seek to end the daily violence, injustice and oppression faced by African Americans."

Transcript available here: "Beloved Community" – talk by Tara Brach

The pathway to presence does not involve efforts or striving. As you will find in this simple, gentle meditation, a vibrant and healing presence is possible as we wake up all our senses and intentionally relax with our changing experience. The gift is a true sense of homecoming, and with that openheartedness and peace.

This guided practice helps us come into our senses through a body scan. We then rest in the awareness that is listening to and feeling the changing flow of experience. When the mind drifts, the return is a relaxing back to our senses, and to the sea of awareness that includes and experiences the waves of life.

From the meditation closing:

As part of closing this meditation, sensing whatever wish or blessing you'd like to offer to yourself right now. What would bring healing happiness your life? Widening that heart space to include someone who is dear to you. Sensing your appreciation for that person's goodness. Offering your wish, your blessings to them. Sensing the heart as edgeless… boundless… open… including all of life everywhere.

May all beings everywhere be filled with loving presence, held in loving presence. May all beings everywhere find great and natural peace. May all beings everywhere be happy, know the natural joy of being alive. May all beings everywhere awaken and be free.

Namaste

If we realized how profoundly our chronic judgment creates separation and blocks the flow of love, we'd dedicate more deeply to disarming our hearts. Drawing on practices from the Bodhisattva path, these two talks explore the process of disarming—bridging divides with those close in, and opening our hearts to those at a distance who we consider a 'bad other" or enemy. As we cultivate the capacity for true disarming, we experience a growing sense of belonging, Oneness and the freedom of an awakened heart.

As we relax and awaken through our physical body, we discover the formless dimension of awareness or spirit that permeates all of life. This meditation includes a poem, "the spirit likes to dress up," from Mary Oliver.

This 3- part series explores three capacities we all have, that when cultivated, bring spiritual awakening and serve the healing of our world. Drawing on an ancient teaching story from India, we explore together the power of a forgiving heart, the inner fire that expresses as courage and dedication, and the inquiry of "who am I" that reveals our deepest nature. The three qualities often described as the essence of awareness: wakeful, open, tender."

The attitude of meditation is one of engaged listening – a relaxed, receptive yet intimate attention. This meditation explores how we can listen to sounds, listen to and feel sensations, and then relax back into the ocean of awareness that includes and perceives the changing waves. In this relaxing back, we realize the peace and freedom of inhabiting our wholeness and essence.

This 3- part series explores three capacities we all have, that when cultivated, bring spiritual awakening and serve the healing of our world. Drawing on an ancient teaching story from India, we explore together the power of a forgiving heart, the inner fire that expresses as courage and dedication, and the inquiry of "who am I" that reveals our deepest nature.

Only in silence and presence do we realign with what matters to our hearts. This simple practice of arriving in an embodied awareness supports us in touching the grounds of true transformation and healing. It closes with a powerful poem by Gunilla Norris, "Sharing Silence."

This 3-part series explores three capacities we all have, that when cultivated, bring spiritual awakening and serve the healing of our world. Drawing on an ancient teaching story from India, we explore together the power of a forgiving heart, the inner fire that expresses as courage and dedication, and the inquiry of "who am I" that reveals our deepest nature.

The pathway to experiencing full aliveness and openheartedness is by awakening awareness throughout the body. This meditation begins by establishing a rhythmic inflow and outflow of the breath, in order to calm and collect the mind. Then continuing with the conscious breathing, we are guided through the body – bringing attention to sensations and space. This attention becomes a very vibrant living presence, and we end by experiencing that living presence as a natural openheartedness that includes all of life.

The pace of change is speeding up and much of the news we receive is alarming. More than ever, we need the inner reflections and meditations that help us connect with our capacities for clarity, bravery and openheartedness. This is what Tara explores with Oren Jay Sofer, in his book entitled: Your Heart Was Made For This: Contemplative Practices to Meet a World in Crisis with Courage, Integrity, and Love (2023.) Oren teaches mindfulness, meditation and non violent communication, and his prior book is bestselling Say What You Mean: A Mindful Approach to Nonviolent Communication (2018.) Learn more about Oren Jay Sofer and order books at: https://www.orenjaysofer.com

When we learn to listen to our inner life without interference, we open to a tender and full experience of presence. This meditation guides us in awakening an intimate quality of listening, as we attend to sensations, moods, sounds and the entire dance of life.

We have strong conditioning to identify as a separate self, and to feel all the fears and attachments that arise from not realizing our true belonging. This talk includes teachings and several experiential reflections that help us wake up from the trance of separation. As we grow familiar with the awareness and love that is our shared true nature, we naturally live from that loving, and experience a growing freedom and joy. [Spring Retreat, April 2024 - Art of Living Retreat Center]

This practice brings attention to the continuous space within and around the body, and the aliveness of sound, sensation and feeling that lives through us. While it's natural for attention to get distracted, the pathway home is a relaxing back into the awake space that is aware of this changing life.

Many are familiar with the Dali Lama's words "My religion is kindness." In this conversation you will sense the gritty and real way that we struggling humans can learn to cherish one another. We talk about the relationship between boundaries and compassion; the unshakeable goodness at our core; how we belong to each other, and how judgments arise from delusion and blind us to the blessing of that belonging.

Father Greg Boyle is an American Catholic priest of the Jesuit order. He is the founder and director of Homeboy Industries, the world's largest gang intervention and rehabilitation program, author of several books, including Tattoos on the Heart; Barking to the Choir; and in 2023, The Whole Language: The Power of Extravagant Tenderness.

Father Greg's life and work are a huge inspiration: he is dedicated to living from love and cultivating loving community with a marginalized population of ex inmates, gang members and their families. You can find out more about Father Greg and Homeboy Industries at: https://homeboyindustries.org/our-story/father-greg/

When we attune to the inner body, we discover a field of energy and aliveness that is the portal to pure presence. This meditation guides our attention to the inner body, opens to the play of sound and invites us to rest in the awake awareness that includes and is the grounds of this living world.

Mindfulness and compassion, when brought to our wounded heart, have the capacity to rewire our brain and free our spirit. This talk explores the ways we get trapped in the trance of feeling unworthy and unlovable, and how, with a wise attention, we can profoundly transform our relationship with our inner life. NOTE: this talk was given at the 5-day "The Undivided Heart" residential retreat on 2024-04-09.

In times of stress, it's crucial that we have pathways to quiet our minds, relax our bodies and rest in a calm, steady presence. This meditation guides us in using the breath, body scan, and a home base of presence to find that inner refuge that can carry us through difficult times.

Just as presence is the heart of meditation, so deep listening is at the center of all conscious, loving relationships. This talk explores how our wants and fears block listening, ways we can deepen our capacity for listening, and the healing that unfolds when we truly feel heard by another. What happens when you're really listening?

The attitude of meditation is one of engaged listening – a relaxed, receptive yet intimate attention. This meditation explores how we can listen to sounds, listen to and feel sensations, and then relax back into the ocean of awareness that includes and perceives the changing waves. In this relaxing back, we realize the peace and freedom of inhabiting our wholeness and essence.

You might ask, "Is it possible to let go just a little more right now?" Include what arises, sounds, whatever reactions to the sounds, sensations in the body. Let life live through you, resting in that wakefulness, openness, silence that's listening.

In this conversation, recorded for the acclaimed podcast, No Small Endeavor, award winning theologian Lee C. Camp interviews Tara about radically accepting and loving our being, just as we are. The conversation includes an unpacking of the RAIN meditation, and stories of navigating difficulty from Tara's life.

No Small Endeavor, produced by Great Feeling Studios and PRX, brings you thoughtful conversations with artists, theologians and philosophers about what it means to live a good life. You can find the No Small Endeavor Podcast on your favorite podcast app or listen to more episodes here: https://link.chtbl.com/LN08h4po?sid=TaraBrach

One translation of mindfulness, in Chinese, is "present heart." In this guided meditation we begin by awakening through the body and the senses, and then open the attention to the changing flow of experience. The intention is to meet whatever arises with a wakeful and kind presence.

It's so helpful to say, "What's happening inside me right now?" Then, "Can I meet this with kindness, with a present heart?"