An Equation for Expansion

Hey, welcome back to your Daily Mindfulness. In today's session, we're going to talk about pain and surrender. I'll start by sharing an equation. Pain + surrender = expansion. When you experience pain, the usual tendency is to resist, suppress, and brace.

This reinforces patterns of internal tension, strengthening the egos resolve to stay in control. But when you meet your pain with soft awareness, you invite your ego to surrender, which creates acceptance, trust, space, and expansion. Real sustainable peace will not come from the ego fighting your internal experiences. It only comes from relaxing into the vastness of your awareness, which can hold all of you with space and presence. The doorway into this is surrender.

And although I never wish pain on anyone, it does tend to be one of the key experiences that leads us to this surrender. So see if you can keep this perspective in mind today, pain + surrender = expansion. Thank you for your practice. Let's settle in for today's meditation.