Welcome – In today’s practice, lets begin to explore emotions.  There is a common saying in meditation that what you resist persists – but awareness assumes acceptance.

If you resist emotions they will become stronger.   Acceptance inspires freedom from strong emotions and the thoughts around them.  Let’s cultivate the quality of acceptance in our practice today as we look at how to sit with emotions, specifically, fear when it arises in our practice.

Let’s begin…

• Bring your attention to how you are feeling today.  You may notice restlessness or distraction as you begin.  Allow it to be there, gently noticing it.
• Notice when fear is arising….Not seeing it as a problem
• Not identifying with it.
• Not seeing yourself as a fearful person
• Instead pay attention to how fear feels in your body, notice any physical sensations arising…tightness in the back of the throat.
• Not getting caught in your thoughts that the emotion of fear may be producing.
• Lean into it, not away from the emotion
• Not wanting to remove it, ignore it, or deny it.
• Notice the physical sensations arising…tightness in the back of the throat.
• Can you just be with fear?
• Notice how the energy of fear changes as you pay attention to it.
• It may be really uncomfortable to be here.  Remember we are training the mind to be comfortable with all the uncomfortableness in life.
• Notice how the energy of fear changes as you pay attention to it.
• Not trying to intellectually understand it, just be with the bare sensation of how it feels in the body.
• How does fear effect your breathing?  Meet it skillfully using the breath as your foundation.
• If disabling thoughts arise come back to your foundation of the breath moving in your body.  Enjoying the sensation of the breath moving in and out.

End…

Notice if the outcome of your practice today was different than what you believed it would be like.  I look forward to guiding you in your next practice.