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

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Okay.

So, I think it's a coincidence, announcement and what I'm going to say next.

I'm going to talk about a topic which is a reputation of being unpopular in the Buddhist West.

And I hope by the time we finish, it becomes popular.

And so I'll begin with an analogy to get to the topic.

If you are really tense, something's going on in your life,

you're really tense, you're kind of beside yourself in tension and preoccupation and concern.

And you're starting to feel like you're not really being efficient,

get anything done, just kind of like going in circles and, you know,

or you're trying to cook, but you're dropping everything,

and you're taking more time cleaning up than you spend time trying to cook, and it's not really, cooking's not even working, but just imagine

you're so tense. And so finally it dawns on you. You know, maybe I should meditate.

And you sit down, and you're not really ambitious in meditating, you just sit down to just sit there

and be present for all this tension, all this agitation that's there.

And maybe you close your eyes, maybe you sit upright.

And as you sit there, something begins subtling.

Some of the tension might even feel like it's draining away.

And something gets a little bit quieter.

And you feel your shoulders release, maybe your belly releases.

So this is kind of nice.

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