Guided Meditations

Exploring the Line of Myself

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• Get into a comfortable meditation position, then let your body relax and fall still.
• Watch your breath for a few moments, trying to keep the mind focused on one single point at the tip of your nose. Watch the air as it moves out and then back in.
• Now think about how you normally define the line between yourself and everything else. What is you, and what is not you? Find the line that separates you from everything else.
• This body—is it a part of you? Normally we identify very strongly with our bodies as ourselves.
• Now think of where this body came from—all the way back to when the sperm and egg joined together at your conception.
• This body comes from the bodies of two other people. What part of that sperm from your father or egg from your mother belonged to you?
• Think of all that sustains the body—the food and water and air that nourish it, that transform and become part of the body. What about those substances is you?
• Now go back to watching your breath. Watch the air as it enters your nostrils—at what point does the air become part of you? Isn’t it the same air once it enters the body?
• Think about it—you have the habit of seeing this body, which is composed of all sorts of outer things, as a part of your self. That line you’ve drawn around this body in your mind, and labeled “me,” is completely artificial.
• Once we realize that the self we are used to thinking about is just an artificial idea in our own mind, then we can play with the possibility of changing it. Let’s see if we can widen our circle of our “self.”
• Pick one person, someone you are close to, and decide: “They are a part of me. I will take care of them exactly as I would care for myself.”
• Imagine what it is that this other you wants, what it is they need. Try and figure out the hopes and dreams of this new you.
• Now think about how you can make each of them happen. Make a plan in your mind of how you will go about fulfilling all your new desires. Really believe that they are now your own.

Helpful Hints

• At the beginning, this way of thinking will feel very forced. But like anything we practice, it gets easier and easier.
• At first, you don’t have to actually act out fulfilling this other you’s desires after you get out of the meditation. Just thinking about doing it will have a powerful effect on your mind.
• But eventually, the line actually will shift, and you’ll really start to feel that this person is part of you. And then you’ll really want to do all you can to make them—I mean yourself—happy.