Awakening Compassion in a Fearful World: The Practice of Tonglen

Tara Brach

Tara, Dharma, Selfhelp, Talks, Spiritual, Buddhist, Insight, Audio, Tarabrach, Mindfulness, Rain, Psychology, Compassion, Vipassana, Health & Fitness, Mental Health, Meditation, Guided, Brach, Buddhism, Religion & Spirituality

4.8 • 10.6K Ratings

🗓️ 20 November 2025

⏱️ 58 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

As anxiety, division, and digital distance numb our hearts, we risk losing our ability to truly feel the lives of others. In this talk, we'll explore how compassion arises when another becomes real to us — when we can imagine their inner world and sense our shared belonging. Through reflections, stories, and the Tibetan practice of tonglen, we'll learn how to transform suffering into care, and re-open the relational pathways that let us act from love.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome, friends, to the Tara Brock podcast. I'm so glad you're here.
0:11.3	Each week, I share teachings and guided meditations to help us awaken our hearts and bring healing
0:17.8	to our world.
0:24.4	You can learn more or support this offering by visiting tarabrock.com,
0:27.1	where you can also join our email list.
0:32.5	Now, let's explore together
0:34.7	the many ways we can live
0:36.7	from the love and presence that's our deepest essence.
0:45.3	Namaste.
0:48.2	Namaste, welcome.
1:14.3	Thank you for being here, friends.
1:17.6	I'd like to begin with a story I read as a New Yorker author, and he describes how when
1:25.7	his son turned 12, they kind of lost their closeness and they
1:29.9	weren't really able to have conversations and finally he stumbled on texting as a way to
1:37.4	keep some connection even though he abhorred it. And this was in the early days of texting.
1:43.9	So he caught on some, his son taught him
1:46.3	some abbreviations, but he says, the one he didn't have to teach me because it was so self-evident
1:52.5	was L-O-L, and I knew right away that it meant lots of love. Because he put it at the end of every message he sent me. So he says such a
2:04.6	beautiful telegraphic abbreviation for the 20th century like a little arrow of love you can
2:10.1	send out to anybody you know. Then he described the next six months his infatuation with
2:16.4	instant messaging and its kind of power of emotional
2:20.0	transmission. He sent LOL to everyone he knew. His sister was getting a divorce, and he wrote to her,
	...

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