Quote

The muscles used to make a smile actually send a biochemical message to our nervous system that it is safe to relax the flight of freeze response.

Tara Brach

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Tara Brach
Age: 71
Born: 1953
Born: May 17
Peace Activist
Psychologist
Teacher
Messages
Biochemical
Response
Freeze
Smile
Muscles
Safe
Relax
System
Send
Actually
Flight
Used
Nervous
Make
Message

More quotes by Tara Brach

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Presence is not some exotic state that we need to search for or manufacture. In the simplest terms, it is the felt sense of wakefulness, openness, and tenderness that arises when we are fully here and now with our experience.
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Underneath the stress is fear, and the biggest is our own personal fear of failure.
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If I can forgive the attachment in myself and open to the vulnerability that's underneath it, then rather than fixating on another person to satisfy my need, I'm actually going right to where the needs come from and able to bring a real healing.
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We, like the Mother of the World, become the compassionate presence that can hold, with tenderness, the rising and passing waves of suffering.
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The intimacy that arises in listening and speaking truth is only possible if we can open to the vulnerability of our own hearts. Breathing in, contacting the life that is right here, is our first step. Once we have held ourselves with kindness, we can touch others in a vital and healing way.
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As I noticed feelings and thoughts appear and disappear, it became increasingly clear that they were just coming and going on their own. . . . There was no sense of a self owning them.
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Pain is not wrong. Reacting to pain as wrong initiates the trance of unworthiness. The moment we believe something is wrong, our world shrinks and we lose ourselves in the effort to combat the pain.
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The main thing going on around intimacy is that we've developed a lot of strategies so we'll be a desirable package.
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People have to find their rhythm. Some people have need for more contact and time together and some people need more space.
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I think of desire as the essence that brings forth the whole universe.
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We're so used to presenting ourselves and getting approval according to our achievements that it's difficult to be authentic and trust that we'll be accepted just as we are.
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Allowing another to be as they are is more what I think of as space. The space to express yourself and know that you're going to be accepted. That's more where I go than with the actual physical logistics of how much time you have together and how much time you have apart.
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If there's a demand of being together in a certain way, those expectations and judgements take away from that space and create an edginess and a cramped-ness to the relationship.
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My first book, 'Radical Acceptance', grew out of the suffering of feeling personally deficient and unworthy. Because most of us are so quick to turn against ourselves, the teachings and practices of radical acceptance continue as a strong current in 'True Refuge': nurturing a forgiving, understanding heart is a basic step on the path.
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I registered the dukkha of self-aversion with such clarity that I knew there was no freedom unless I could love this life without holding back. This didn't mean I was going to ignore my flaws and stop seeking to improve what I could. But in the deepest way, I was not going to fixate on the conclusion that something was wrong with me.
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True refuge is that which allows us to be at home, at peace, to discover true happiness. The only thing that can give us true refuge is the awareness and love that is intrinsic to who we are. Ultimately, its our own true nature.
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But this revolutionary act of treating ourselves tenderly can begin to undo the aversive messages of a lifetime.
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I want to accept myself completely, just as I am.
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With the first out breath, you are releasing worries, plans, mental tensions. With the second out breath, you are releasing physical tightness and tension. With the third out breath, you are releasing difficult emotions.
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Along with judging myself harshly, I'd also always seen the truth of goodness in me.
Tara Brach