I’d like you to sit quietly and just let everything be the way it is.

First, close your eyes for a few moments, then open them. After five seconds with your eyes open, practice being aware of the objects around you. Did this add anything to your experience, or were you already aware as soon as you opened your eyes?

Now close your eyes again, and take a few minutes to sit comfortably and shift your attention from your thinking mind to the coming and going of your breath. Instead of starting to practice your accustomed meditation technique, I’d like you to sit quietly and just let everything be the way it is. Don’t focus or manipulate your attention in any way, don’t try to be mindful, don’t do anything in particular; just let everything be, without trying to change or avoid or get rid of anything.

Ordinarily our attention tends to focus on thoughts, feelings, stories and the other objects of our experience, constantly shifting from object to object. If you practice Kindfulness, you make an effort to bring more kindful attention to these objects. Instead, let go of this emphasis on objects and relax back into awareness itself. Rest as the open, unconditional awareness in which experiences come and go. This awareness is inherently silent, present and still; it doesn’t require any effort on your part, and it doesn’t do or cultivate anything, it simply welcomes what is just the way it is.

Let yourself rest as this silent, open, unconditional awareness or presence. No effort, no manipulation, no cultivation, no doing, just rest as awareness and let everything be as it is.