Tara Brach leads a guided body scan meditation, Letting Thought Clouds Come and Go. When the mind has drifted into a thought cloud, it can be a chance to wake up, rest in an openness that is larger than thoughts, and let the clouds come and go.
Tara Brach is a clinical psychologist and meditation teacher who blends Western psychology with Buddhist practice.
In this guided meditation, Tara Brach guides listeners through a body scan and into a sense of awareness of the energies moving through both body and mind. As we begin to witness our thoughts as if they were clouds, we may realize that we are not our thoughts. We are more like the open sky, the space within which thoughts come and go.
The Cluttered, Cloudy Sky
We might consider the mind, when caught up in rampant thought, to be like a cloudy day. The sky, or our open awareness, is cluttered with thoughts that impede us from connecting with the vastness and clear-sightedness that is ever-present regardless of the weather. When our attention is fixated on our thoughts, we may experience anxiety, stress, and other heavy emotions. As we learn to relate to these clouds in a different way, from the knowingness of the sky, the heaviness may begin to clear and we might find more calmness and clarity.
Witnessing Thoughts as Clouds
To practice this new way of relating to our thoughts, we can listen to Letting Thought Clouds Come and Go, or take a few moments of silence to mindfully observe whatever feelings, emotions, thoughts, or beliefs are passing through us. Each time we notice something that clouds our clarity of vision, we can tune back into the breath or into the vast space inside the body, grounding ourselves in a broader perspective of the present moment.
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