The following talk is given by Tara Brock, meditation teacher, psychologist and author.

One person at a previous retreat described his changing experience, how he would

go into spaces of really openness and clarity and then plunge into all sorts of

feelings of pride and then self-aversion, just this rollercoaster and he at the

end described his takeaway and he said the joy is in getting real. It's that as

many of you have noticed the words this too, that keeps on no matter what the

it is, keeps on including. It's a tender presence that life, different weather

systems can move through. So I thought I'd share one note that in a way describes

this from one of our friends here and the title feels true. Settling into what is

here, what is true, the felt sense that I ate too much, sit with the fear that I'm

getting fat, hand on belly, I offer compassion and receive instead confirmation.

So we start right there and say, well this too, right? I think one of the most

compelling questions that arises around now because some of us at least start

leaning forward and thinking about the what snacks at home. The questions really,

okay I've touched something I cherish or value, some quality of open-heartedness and being

and how to live with that more moments. How many of you have that's just been kind of right

at the core of like how to really live with that more? Yeah.

It's been one of our traditions on the final night to offer some reflections on what

sometimes described as the bodhisattva path or bodhisattva pathless path because that's what

it really is, which is really living from awakened heart. It comes from a wisdom realization

that we all have the same shared essence of loving presence and more that recognition,

that's what we are and we can together hold this life that comes up, we belong together.

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