Welcome to Centred Meditation and our Heart Expansion Meditation today.
Spending a few moments getting comfortable in your position,
Making any adjustments you need and feeling free to make any adjustments during the practice itself.
Closing your eyelids and turning your awareness inside the body to observe the breath.
Observing all the movements and sensations associated with the inhale and the exhale.
And encouraging the breath down a little deeper,
Expanding the belly on the inhale,
Gently drawing it back in on the exhale.
And we'll move our awareness around the body to release any tensions we may be holding on to.
We'll begin around the forehead,
The eyebrows,
The eyelids,
Encouraging these muscles to soften and allowing that softness to move down your face,
Into your jaw.
Feeling that softness moving down into your jaw,
Your neck.
Allowing your shoulders to drop away from your ears.
Your belly relaxes a little more,
Noticing the gentle movement of the belly with the breath.
And with each exhale,
Feeling any remnants of tension dissolving.
Scanning all the muscles connected to your hips,
A common place to store both physical and emotional tension.
And bringing that softness into these areas.
Moving this softness further down the body from the hips to the thighs,
Knees,
Shins and calves,
All the way to your toes.
Now that your body is moving closer towards ease,
I invite you to visualize a scene of unconditional love or joy.
Allowing that scene to bring a warmth to your chest.
If you wish,
Even placing one hand on your chest to encourage that warmth to develop.
Keeping that scene in mind.
Allowing that warmth to move from your chest to spread around your body.
Moving up through your shoulders,
Towards your head.
From your shoulders down to your fingertips.
Let it move around the chest and the belly and into your hips.
Keep on coming back to that scene of unconditional love or joy.
The warmth that brings to your body.
The sense of ease it brings to the mind.
And when this warmth has moved all the way,
The crown of your head to the tips of your fingers,
To your toes.
Feeling the air warming around you.
And now that you are overflowing with this warmth,
Feeling confident,
Sending it to your loved ones,
Family,
Your friends.
Seeing as this warmth transfers into their bodies,
How it relaxes their faces,
Their shoulders,
How their tensions become a little lighter.
And using this expansion of the warmth as your anchor for the remainder of the practice.
Allowing it to keep being cultivated in your body and sending it to others.
If you wish to use another anchor such as your breath or your mantra,
Please feel free to do so.
Whichever anchor you choose,
Remember,
It's just a lazy,
Easy level of awareness.
So much so that your mind will wander from time to time.
And when you notice that your mind is wandering,
Moving your awareness back to your anchor without any self-judgment,
Without any criticism.
Gradually letting go of your anchor,
Letting go of any thoughts you may be on.
And then returning to your breath.
Returning to those expansive belly breaths and the slow exhale.
Bringing some gentle movement to your fingers and your toes.
Moving and stretching as needed.
Thanking yourself for finding the time and space for meditation today.
Letting that sense of acknowledgement sink in for a few moments.
We don't often acknowledge our self-care or time we put into these restorative practices.
Sitting with that for a moment.
