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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.

Tara Brach

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Tara Brach
Age: 71
Born: 1953
Born: May 17
Peace Activist
Psychologist
Teacher
Love
Didn
Improve
Fixate
Life
Back
Conclusion
Registered
Without
Seeking
Aversion
Self
Unless
Deepest
Mean
Knew
Flaws
Going
Stop
Ignore
Something
Wrong
Clarity
Way
Freedom
Holding

More quotes by Tara Brach

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It is through realizing loving presence as our very essence, through being that presence, that we discover true freedom.
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.
Tara Brach
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Unless we're completely awake, have a degree of that. We tense against love and hold on in a way that doesn't let it flow. When that's really strong, the key piece to freeing our hearts is self-compassion.
Tara Brach
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Telling each other the truth and being who we are, and having space for the other person's vulnerability in being who they are, allows us to move in a kind of dance together that's very fluid and graceful.
Tara Brach
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Even a few moments of offering lovingkindness can reconnect you with the purity of your loving heart.
Tara Brach
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The spiritual path is not a solo endeavor. In fact, the very notion of a self who is trying to free her/ himself is a delusion. We are in it together and the company of spiritual friends helps us realize our interconnectedness.
Tara Brach
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Meditation helps us to get out of our thoughts about the future and really be in the present moment.
Tara Brach
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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.
Tara Brach
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Relaxation is the doorway to both wisdom and compassion.
Tara Brach
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I would say both Western psychology and Eastern paths would recognize that we get caught up in feeling like a separate self and an unworthy self.
Tara Brach
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I speak a lot about what I call the trance of unworthiness which is really epidemic in our culture, this sense of I'm not enough, or something's wrong with me. Most of us have some level of it because our culture has all these standards (handed down through our families) of what it means to be okay.
Tara Brach
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I knew I could hold myself with that absolute love and compassion.
Tara Brach
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In the process of deeply accepting our own inner experience, instead of being identified with a story of a limited self, we realize the compassion and wakefulness that is our essence.
Tara Brach
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Even going through the motions is a way of establishing a new relationship with our inner life that is caring and tender, versus one that is judging, distancing or ignoring. This is the beginning of being capable of intimacy with others.
Tara Brach
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When desire for a certain person's attention becomes an I have to have kind of grasping, then identity gets organized around needing that and it becomes very solid and sticky. That causes suffering because we're not inhabiting the fullness of who we are, we're fixated and contracted on life being a certain way.
Tara Brach
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With mindfulness training we are able to recognize when we get lost in our mental dramas, and bring a kind and nonreactive presence to the feelings that accompany them.
Tara Brach
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We are waiting for the next moment to contain what this moment does not.
Tara Brach
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By regarding ourselves with kindness, we begin to dissolve the identity of an isolated, deficient self. This creates the grounds for including others in an unconditionally loving heart.
Tara Brach
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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.
Tara Brach
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Underneath the stress is fear, and the biggest is our own personal fear of failure.
Tara Brach