Tara Brach

Love, and Death - Retreat Talk (2016-12-29) - To live our lives fully, we need to embrace the natural unfolding of birthing and dying. Yet we are deeply conditioned to resist loss, to pull away from fear and grief. Through a powerful Inuit story shared by Clarissa Estes, this talk explores how our practices of presence can open us to what we avoid, and free us to love without holding back. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Retreat Meditation: A Liberating Awareness - Embodying Full Presence (2016-12-30) - This vipassana meditation establishes fertile grounds for presence by gladdening the mind, a mindful body scan, collecting the attention and including all that arises in a kind, clear presence.

Darkness of the Womb - Four Key Steps in Transforming Suffering (2017-01-25) - We can either repeat old fear based patterns, or our suffering can awaken us to a deeper wisdom and greater love. This talk explores four principles in relating to difficulty that move us towards healing and freedom - both personally and as a society.

Meditation - The Return to Presence: Rest Your Mind In What Is (2017-01-25) - It's natural that our attention wanders, and the more we relax back, the more that becomes our habit…returning to presence. This meditation opens with conscious breathing and awakening through the body. We then rest in open awareness, and when the attention drifts, guide ourselves to rest our minds, over and over, in the aliveness and presence that is right here. Free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease" when you join her email list.

Your Awake Heart Is Calling You (2017-01-18) - As individuals and societies, we are pulled by both the insecurity of our evolutionary past, and by our awake heart, our capacity for mindfulness and compassion. This talk explores the ways we can listen to and respond to the call of our awake heart, by training ourselves to open to vulnerability - our own and others - and widen the circles of compassion. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Awakening Compassion with Tonglen - Our hearts awaken as we let ourselves be touched by the suffering within and around us. They shine as we respond with care to what has touched us. This meditation uses the breath to guide us in letting in and contacting suffering, and offering out our love. With practice this meditation enables us to realize the truth of our connectedness and the luminous love that is intrinsic to awareness.

Meditation: A Witnessing, Kind Presence (2017-01-18) - 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. Free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease" when you join her email list.

Dissolving Trance with RAIN (2017-01-11) - One of the pervasive expressions of trance is identifying with a limited and separate sense of self. This talk contrasts the self-trance to our intrinsically open, awake and loving awareness. We then explore how the mindfulness and self-compassion in the RAIN practice can directly dissolve trance and reconnect us to our true nature. Free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease" when you join her email list.

Meditation: Cultivating a Relaxed Attention (2017-01-11) - In this meditation we engage a relaxed and alert attention by scanning through the body, opening to sound, and resting in the awareness that includes all the senses. This presence is stabilized with the use of a home base, for many the breath, and reminders to "relax back" when the mind naturally drifts. Free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease" when you join her email list.

Heart Meditation: Awakening Loving Presence (2016-12-31) ~ We each have an intrinsic capacity for loving presence, and there are powerful ways of paying attention that bring this potential alive. This meditation uses the image and felt sense of a smile to bring a relaxed receptivity to the body. We then engage with our future self (our Being when our heart is fully awake) and explore what it means to embody the fullness of that wisdom and love. (given on the last afternoon of the 2016 IMCW 5-day New Year's silent retreat)

Refuge in Truth, Love and Awareness (2017-01-04) - The three archetypal refuges of truth, love and awareness are interweaving pathways home found in most spiritual traditions. This talk looks at our habitual pursuit of substitutes to feel happy, and reflects on how we awaken through each true refuge. The talk ends with a living ritual anyone can participate in that helps us remember these refuges as we move through our lives. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Quieting the Mind (2017-01-04) - We open with a reading on silence, and then relax our bodies, calm our minds and rest in the inflow and outflow of the breath. This simple meditation on relaxing with the breath ends with a verse on the blessings of quieting our mind. Free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease" when you join her email list.

Don't Know Mind - Thoughts, and more broadly, conceptual knowledge, cannot lead to the direct realization of truth, of reality. While thoughts are an essential part of surviving and thriving, spiritual awakening only becomes possible when we step out of the trance of thinking. This talk invites listeners into the radical openness and freedom of not-knowing. (a favorite from 2009-06-10)

Meditation: A Listening Presence with Smile Body Scan (2016-11-10) - Listening to sounds is a powerful way to quiet the thinking mind and connect with the natural openness of awareness. This meditation emphasizes the anchor of listening, and guides us to relax through our bodies, filling them with the image of a smile. In this receptivity we find a homecoming to full presence and peace.

Question and Response: Heart Practices - (2016-11-05) - follow-up to the guided heart practice: Taking in the Goodness. Tara replies to questions from retreatants. ~ from the IMCW Fall retreat

Heart Meditation with Instructions: Taking in the Goodness (2016-11-05) - previously published without lead-in instructions. ~ from the IMCW Fall retreat Rumi said, "Whenever some kindness comes to you, turn that way – toward the source of kindness." This meditation guides us to look for the source of loving and to turn in that direction. It begins with a lovingkindness practice that spreads the image of a smile into the body, then continues with a practice of seeing the goodness of ourselves and others. "What's it like when you communicate your appreciation of goodness to another person?"

The Revolution of Tenderness - Part 2 (2016-12-21) - These two talks explore our capacity to be tender - sensitive and responsive to ourselves and others. This capacity marks a radical evolutionary shift from a self-centered existence shaped by fear, to a life lived from the realization of our collective belonging and the preciousness of all life. The talks examine the conditioning that inclines us toward dissociation and emotional reactivity, and the practices of presence that evolve our heart and awareness.

Meditation: Breathing into Presence (2016-12-21) - The breath can be our gateway into the boundless awareness that holds all life. This meditation begins with a breath that calms our nervous system, and then invites a relaxed presence with the breath and sensation that open us to the "universe breathing." Resting in awareness, we realize the wakefulness, peace and vitality of pure presence. "The whole universe is the body breathing..." Free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease" when you join her email list.

The Revolution of Tenderness - Part 1 (2016-12-14) - These two talks explore our capacity to be tender - sensitive and responsive to ourselves and others. This capacity marks a radical evolutionary shift from a self-centered existence shaped by fear, to a life lived from the realization of our collective belonging and the preciousness of all life. The talks examine the conditioning that inclines us toward dissociation and emotional reactivity, and the practices of presence that evolve our heart and awareness. from Tara's talk: Pope Francis invites us to "live the revolution of tenderness," which is expressed through closeness, compassion and service... Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation - Awake Awareness is our Home (2016-12-14) - This meditation guides us in awakening our awareness by opening to all our senses and recognizing the alert presence that is always, already here. By relaxing back into the presence over and over, we become familiar with the reality that is truly our home. Free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease" when you join her email list.

Spiritual Reparenting (2016-12-07) - When we are not sufficiently nurtured in childhood, we are inclined toward anxiety, depression, addiction and other forms of suffering. In a deep way, we do not feel at home with others, and are disconnected from our own body, heart and spirit. This talk explores how meditation offers "spiritual reparenting" as we learn to bring interest, understanding and love to our own inner vulnerability. This process of healing extends to our relationships with others and our larger society - by reaching out to widening circles with interest and care, we bring increasing harmony and peace to our world. "How do we love ourselves into healing?" Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation - Relaxing Back into Living Presence (2016-12-07) - When we are lost in thoughts our mind contracts, our body tightens and we disconnect from true openheartedness. The pathway home is through "relaxing back" and reopening our attention to our senses, relaxing through our body, and gently contacting the felt sense in our heart. By repeatedly relaxing back, we become increasingly familiar with the vibrancy, tenderness and openness of true presence. Free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease" when you join her email list.

Trusting the Gold (retreat talk)(2016-11-10) - When we are unaware of the emotions and beliefs that shape our experience, we are in a trance characterized by an identity as a separate, incomplete self. Trance obscures the awareness and love that is our deepest essence. This talk explores the two key pathways of awakening from trance and recognizing and trusting the gold of our true nature. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Heart Meditation: Taking in the Goodness (2016-11-05) (from the IMCW Fall Retreat) - Rumi said, "Whenever some kindness comes to you, turn that way – toward the source of kindness." This meditation guides us to look for the source of loving and to turn in that direction. It begins with a lovingkindness practice that spreads the image of a smile into the body, then continues with a practice of seeing the goodness of ourselves and others. "What's it like when you communicate your appreciation of goodness to another person?"

"Play a Greater Part" - Bodhisattva for our Times - Part 2 (2016-11-23) - During scary and uncertain times, the habitual reflex is to try to find ground by creating stories about what's happening and hardening into us-them blame. This only perpetuates the aggression and violence that is so prevalent in our societies. These two talks are a reflection on how we as awakening bodhisattvas can evolve our consciousness in a way that serves authentic societal healing and transformation. "Though I do not expect a plant to spring up where no seed has been, I have great faith in a seed. Convince me you have a seed there, and I am prepared to expect wonders." ~ Thoreau NOTE: Part 2 includes a Tonglen meditation near the end of the talk. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Vipassana - 20 min - Opening Our Hearts to Life as It Is (2016-11-23) - This meditation awakens the senses with a mindful scanning of the body, establishes an anchor for presence, and invites us to arrive again and again, deepening the pathway home. When difficult or intense experience arises, the practice is to learn to open to what is here with a clear, allowing and kind attention. "...widen your heart and mind so you sense your hand is on the heart of the world. Sensing whatever prayer for the world most resonates at this moment and offering it..." Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

"Play a Greater Part" - Bodhisattva for Our Times - Pt1 (2016-11-16) - During scary and uncertain times, the habitual reflex is to try to find ground by creating stories about what's happening and hardening into us-them blame. This only perpetuates the aggression and violence that is so prevalent in our societies. These two talks are a reflection on how we as awakening bodhisattvas can evolve our consciousness in a way that serves authentic societal healing and transformation. "There is no power for change greater than a community discovering what it cares about." - Margaret Wheatley "From bitter searching of the heart, Quickened with passion and with pain We rise to play a greater part. ..." ~ Leonard Cohen Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Vipassana (Mindfulness or Insight) - A gift of meditation is learning to open to life just how it is, with awake awareness. This meditation guides us in establishing an embodied presence, and collecting the attention with mindfulness of the breath. We then open the attention to whatever is predominant, and rest in an open, engaged and receptive presence. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

The Wings of Awakening - Self-Honesty and Love (retreat talk) (2016-11-06) - We evolve our consciousness by bringing a clear and kind attention to the tangles of suffering. This talk explores how the "second arrow" of self-judgment imprisons us in emotional reactivity, and the pathways of awakening awareness that reconnect us with our full human potential. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Starting a Meditation - and No Bell at the End (2016-11-05) - Given in the early morning on the first day of retreat, this recording can settle you into a meditation of any length. There is no bell at the end, so you can make your session as long or short as you wish.

Awakening Consciousness in Shadowy Times - Part 2 - The shadow is the unfaced, unlived fears and emotional pain in our individual and collective psyche. When not brought into awareness it expresses as "no" - the anger, aggression, hopelessness and cynicism that is resisting and opposing life. In this talk we explore how to evolve our consciousness by bringing "yes" - clarity and loving acceptance - to the parts of our being we have been unwilling to feel. This loving "yes" reconnects us to our basic goodness and helps others do the same. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Cultivating a Mindful Awareness (2016-11-02) - Mindfulness means paying attention on purpose to our moment to moment experience. This meditation invites us to collect our attention with the breath and use the breath as a home base for mindful presence. We then include whatever is predominant, recognizing and allowing the changing flow. The blessing of this practice is simple and beautiful: We are learning to be here for our life. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Awakening Consciousness in Shadowy Times (2016-10-26) - On both individual and societal levels, suffering arises from the unseen, unfelt parts of our psyche. This talk looks at two interrelated ways of practice that help us to awaken from a limiting self-sense characterized by "something is wrong with me, or you." In addition to guided meditations, our time includes sharing from participants. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Relaxing Back into Presence (2016-10-26) - When we are stressed, our body and mind contract, and energetically we resist the life in the present moment. This meditation helps de-condition the stress reaction by guiding us to relax open from thoughts, relax physical tension, and gently relax back over and over into living presence. Free download of Tara's 10 min meditation: "Mindful Breathing: Finding Calm and Ease" when you join her email list.

Reflection: Deepening the Truths We Share (2016-10-19) - Our capacity for love grows as we practice deepening the truths we share with each other. This short reflection offers guidance in how to bring your presence and heart to truth telling. From "Seeking What's True — Within Ourselves, Beyond our Self, With Each Other - Part 3"

Seeking What's True – Within Ourselves, Beyond Our Self, With Each Other – (Part 2 of 3) (2016-10-19)- The ground of the spiritual path is realizing the nature of reality and living our lives from this awakened heart and mind. The first of this three-part series examines the process of radical self-honesty – the non-judgmental recognition of what's going on inside us, and especially what has been outside of our conscious awareness. The second talk deepens this process with the practices of self-inquiry, looking directly into the one who is seeking truth. The third part explores the challenges and blessings of honesty in our relationships. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Relaxing Back and Saying Yes to the Moment - When we are stressed, our conditioning is to tighten our body, and tense against our moment to moment experience. This meditation is a powerful practice of de-conditioning this reactivity by learning to relax back into presence, and to respond to difficulty by saying "yes." Through relaxing back and saying "yes," we discover our heart's capacity for unconditional love.

Meditation: Awake, Openhearted Awareness (2016-10-12) - This meditation guides us in recognizing the formless awareness that is always here, but often outside of conscious awareness. As awareness awakens to realize itself, we come home to our primordial nature—boundless, lucid, tender presence. Listen to the full talk: Seeking What's True — Within Ourselves, Beyond our Self, With Each Other (part 2) at: https://www.tarabrach.com/seeking-whats-true-pt2/ Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Seeking What's True - Within Ourselves, Beyond our Self, With Each Other - Pt 2 of 3 (2016-10-12) - The ground of the spiritual path is realizing the nature of reality and living our lives from this awakened heart and mind. The first of this three part series examines the process of radical self-honesty - the non-judgmental recognition of what's going on inside us, and especially what has been outside of our conscious awareness. The second talk deepens this process with the practices of self-inquiry, looking directly into the one who is seeking truth. The third part explores the challenges and blessings of honesty in our relationships. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Breath and Presence (2016-10-12) - For many, relaxing and attending to the movement of the breath provides a powerful anchor for presence. This guided meditation guides us in establishing the breath as a homebase, and then invites a clear and receptive attention to the changing waves of experience. This attention naturally unfolds into a full, tender, inclusive presence. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Seeking What's True: Within Ourselves, Beyond our Self, With Each Other - Pt 1 of 3 (2016-10-05) - The ground of the spiritual path is realizing the nature of reality and living our lives from this awakened heart and mind. The first of this three part series examines the process of radical self-honesty - the non-judgmental recognition of what's going on inside us, and especially what has been outside of our conscious awareness. The second talk deepens this process with the practices of self-inquiry, looking directly into the one who is seeking truth. The third part explores the challenges and blessings of honesty in our relationships. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Receiving Life in Open Awareness (2016-10-05) - Our habit is to try to manage our experience from a mental control tower. This meditation awakens us through the body, and then invites us to rest in that vast presence that includes the changing flow of life. When we inhabit that openness, there's a natural arising of peace, wakefulness and tenderness. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Spiritual Empowerment (2016-09-28) - When we are trying to control life, we are removed from presence, and act in ways that separate us from others and solidify the experience of being a insecure self. This talk explores our often unconscious strategies of seeking power, and the ways that mindful and compassionate awareness reconnects us to the source of true empowerment. When empowered we are tapped into the universal flow of love, wisdom and creativity, and are free to respond to life with "a heart that is ready for anything." Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Receiving This Life in Awareness (2016-09-28) - In our everyday life we are conditioned to feel that life is happening to us, or that we are the doer. This meditation deconditions that self-centrality by bringing attention to the aliveness in our bodies, and then opening to receive the entire play of sounds, sensations and feelings in awareness. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Realizing Our Undefended and Awakened Heart (retreat talk) - It is our evolutionary and spiritual potential to release unnecessary habits of violating other tribes, individuals and unwanted parts of our own being. This talk explores three essential facets of the pathway to awakening: Leaving the fortress of aversive judgment, entering the wilderness of our embodied being and encircling this life with love. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation: Listening to and Feeling Our Life - Listening to sounds is a powerful way to quiet the thinking mind and connect with the natural openness of awareness. This meditation emphasizes the anchor of listening, and guides us to relax through our bodies and let sounds wash through us. In this receptivity we find a homecoming to full presence and peace.

The Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Working with Attachments and Addictions - In Buddhist cosmology the torment of intense desire that can never really be satisfied is depicted as the realm of Hungry Ghosts. This talk explores the attachments and addictions that so many of us struggle with, and the teachings and practices that can liberate us. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Retreat - Morning Instruction - RAIN - Q and A (2016-08-27) - Tara gives morning instruction on retreat including R.A.I.N. (Recognize, Allow, Investigate, Nourish), then responds to questions from retreatants. Includes a question on resourcing when working with trauma. Recorded at the 2016 IMCW Women's Retreat.

Trusting Our Hearts (2016-04-06) - Trust in our basic goodness directly effects our capacity for intimacy with others, creativity and living fully. This talk explores the ways that our caregivers and culture undermine that trust, primarily by giving us messages that we are "not enough" or flawed. We then explore the meditation practices that remind us of our loving hearts, and of the goodness that expresses through others. This remembrance is what nourishes a liberating quality of trust in ourselves and in our life. Your support enables us to continue to offer these talks freely. If you value them, I hope you will consider offering a donation at this time at www.tarabrach.com/donation/. With gratitude and love, Tara

Meditation Instructions and Guided Meditation from Retreat (2016-08-27) - Tara gives morning instructions about how to deepen our meditation, then leads us in a guided meditation.