The following talk was given at the Insight Meditation Center in Redwood City, California.

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When I first started meditating relaxation was not, I mean people said this will help you relax, but I didn't think of actually playing with relaxation as a part of being aware, to actually use relaxation as a support

for awareness.

And so that I really learned with my teacher,

Saioo Utajania. He emphasized relaxation more than any other teacher I had,

and I started to hear it. I took it seriously. And there were times when I was on retreat with him,

and a six-week retreat with him in Burma, that a whole sitting I would just explore relaxation.

And that then I found began to create a container,

that relaxation of being aware with relaxation, right?

It's not just relax, relax, relax, relax, it's relax, allow the body to relax and how is that affecting the physicality? How's that affecting the mind?

And so kind of being curious about the effect of relaxation on the system.

And then I found that that created a condition, some conditions for very naturally

awareness and mindfulness to be there without a lot of effort.

So this is one of the big benefits of relaxation.

I offered in the guided meditation, you know, the relaxation of body and then

relaxing the mind and Gill offers this analogy of relaxing the brain.

That's to me very useful and when that kind of sense of relaxing the mind happens.

Oh, yeah, and I'm aware.

There's a sense perhaps of maybe a broader awareness, not a focused awareness, but there's the recognition, yeah, I'm aware. And that kind of relaxed quality can then be connected with whatever practice that we're doing.

I would say that relaxation is kind of the,

almost a foundational ground

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