Tara Brach, a clinical psychologist and meditation teacher, leads this guided meditation on inner space, adapted from a meditation called Open Focus. Its questions all begin with “can you imagine.”
The purpose of this guided meditation is to help us to sink back into the vast open space of our being. When we are stressed or anxious (or otherwise caught up in the busyness of life), we can lose touch with the formless aspect of our being. We become caught up instead in the egoic tendencies of the mind and our attachment to the human form. This meditation guides us back into our inner space with a sense of curiosity and wonder.
Can You Imagine?
Tara Brach leads this meditation to help us explore the spaciousness of our being. As she moves our attention through the body, we are called to imagine various aspects of our spaciousness. For instance, can you imagine the space that fills the nasal passages? Can you imagine the space that fills your tongue? Can you imagine the aliveness and space that fills the region of the shoulders? This inquiry helps to heighten our sense of awareness, bringing us to a level of perception we are not accustomed to looking out from.
The Space Within Us
Practicing this type of ‘space’ recognition, or awareness of the space within us, brings us to a heightened level of perception. Physically, we are mostly space, and while the brain might not be able to wrap itself around that, this guided meditation invites us to sense how vast the universe within may be. The practice may also help to soothe a racing mind, easing some of the experience of stress and anxiety.
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