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occurs to you, you can pause briefly, touch in with how you’re feeling both physically and mentally, and then connect with your heart—even putting your hand on your heart, if you want to. This is a way of extending warmth and acceptance to whatever is going on for you right now. You might have an aching back, an upset stomach, panic, rage, impatience, calmness, joy—whatever it is, you can let it be there just as it is, without labeling it good or bad, without telling yourself you should or shouldn’t be feeling that way. Having connected with what is, with love and acceptance, you can go forward with curiosity and courage. I call this third step “taking a leap.”
    In order to do this practice, most of us need a bit of support. It’s not always easy to be fully present—or even partly present. It’s not always easy to extend warmth to ourselves. It’s even less easy to let go of our habitual ways of being in the world and take a leap. Fortunately, meditation providesus with exactly the support we need. It’s a practice for staying present, for nurturing our heart, and for letting go.
    Just as we might practice the piano to cultivate our musical ability or practice a sport to cultivate our athletic ability, we can practice meditation to nurture the natural ability of the mind to be present, to feel loving-kindness, to open beyond fixed opinions and views. The meditation that I was taught and that I practice has three main parts: posture, the object of meditation, and the way we relate to thoughts. As I go through these instructions, I’ll point out the aspects that pertain to staying present, feeling your heart, and letting go.
    The basic instruction starts with posture—with the way our body supports us while we’re meditating. We begin by being fully present in our body with awareness of our seat, our legs, our arms, our torso. We take a noble, upright but relaxed posture, which helps us settle internally and contact a feeling of confidence and dignity within ourselves. We are claiming our warriorship, claiming our bravery, claiming a fundamental feeling of all-rightness. If the body is uplifted, the mind will be uplifted. The six points of good posture taught by Chögyam Trungpa help us in this process. They are the seat, the legs, the torso, the hands, the eyes, and the mouth.
    The first point is the seat. Sometimes meditation is referred to as taking your seat. Taking your seat means sitting in meditation with the confidence that you have the right to be there, the right to be fully awake. Literally speaking, the seat should be flat and well balanced. If you prefer, you can sit with a meditation cushion tucked under your buttocks to lift your pelvis and tilt it slightly forward; this helps you sit comfortably without slumping. Whichever way you sit,your body should be in alignment—leaning neither too far forward nor too far backward nor to the right or left. The idea is to find a comfortable position so that you won’t wiggle or keep changing position during your meditation period.
    If you find sitting on a cushion uncomfortable, you can sit in a chair, preferably one with a straight back and a flat seat. Sit slightly forward on the seat so that you’re not leaning against the back of the chair and place both feet flat on the floor.
    The second point of good posture concerns the legs . If you’re sitting on a cushion, your legs should be folded comfortably in front of you. To reduce strain on your back, it’s best to make sure that your knees are not higher than your hips. You can experiment with different leg positions until your find one that is comfortable. If, while you’re meditating, you become very uncomfortable, you can temporarily assume the resting posture: keeping your back straight, bend your knees and draw your legs up toward your chest. You can wrap your arms around your legs to keep them steady.
    The next point of good posture is the torso (your body from the neck to the seat).