Meditating in Joy

There is a way of being in meditation (or even in life), in which our body, both gross and subtle energetic body, is sort of rising up into our chest and throat.

If we were to put words to that feeling, it might be something like “I need/ want to get something/somewhere outside me …”. There is a sense of needing to be somewhere other than here and now…

Then we might be engaging in our meditation in that same way, focused on getting something or going somewhere outside ourselves. And we may be following our meditation technique a bit rigidly perhaps, as though if we “do” it perfectly then it will deliver us “there”.

Then meditation feels more like a task, more about being determined rather than relaxed and joyful...

So I’d like to share a meditation orientation in which we are kind of flipping that way on its head a bit. We are inviting the energy that would go up and out, to reverse direction and come down into the heart and body, feeling our connection with the ground, rooting into the solidity of our form. In this way we can notice and acknowledge that this energy also has another arc, which is inward and downward. So we can settle into that configuration for our meditation, and experience it in ourselves.

We can, if we like, think of that energy as Spirit’s gaze inward and downward. And we can feel the love inherent in this gaze - the time and attention it is giving to us, to every part of us. It is not selective; it is acknowledging and valuing every bit of us ... exactly as we are, as we have been. It is saying yes to us. Yes yes yes! Each breath is beloved, each sensation, each moment of experience is sacred to this gaze. We are loved to the fullest extent, no part left out.