Welcome to today's meditation with Alia.
Today we improve focus and concentration.
As we go on this meditation,
A walk for the mind together,
Remember that it is perfectly okay if you fall asleep.
Sleep is nature's way of telling you that you are safe.
If you find it more reassuring to set an alarm for the end of this session,
Feel free to pause this meditation and do that now.
A wonderful side effect of improving your concentration and focus is it will become almost impossible to let your mind wander off into the places you don't want it to wander off to.
It will become more and more easy to train your mind to pay attention to what you want to pay attention to.
Any negative issues related to anxiety or depression or even general stress that come from a wandering mind will fade and disappear.
If you are in any pain,
These will be the meditative moments where your body can choose to focus elsewhere and let go of the pain bit by bit.
You will also find that with practice your body will begin to use this meditation as a time for the body to rest,
Regenerate and repair.
As you focus on controlling your emotions,
Your thoughts will become easier to observe and furthermore you will be able to observe yourself without any judgment.
Practicing observing the self without taking any action,
Especially in challenging situations,
Allows you to gain the skill of gathering more information about yourself to make a better decision and take actions when calm and collected.
Let's begin with a straight spine,
Either sitting upright or laying down.
It will be very normal that you might start off feeling restless and want to move parts of your body.
Feel free to move any part of your body to get more comfortable.
It is also very normal if you disassociate from your body,
That is,
When your mind or spirit leave your body and they go off into a dream world.
Whenever you notice this just take a breath and come back to feeling your fingers and toes.
As your body relaxes it's normal that you will feel a pleasant strengthening feeling in gravity.
Let go to the support of your laying down or seated position.
Any restlessness will fade away and be replaced by a sense of calm and tranquility.
Let's focus again on concentration.
As you practice using this muscle of your mind it will get stronger.
Your focus and concentration will improve not only in your meditation practice,
It will also improve in your daily life.
At the beginning it will be very normal if your mind wanders off with different thoughts or maybe you feel some discomfort in the body.
Be okay with starting again.
If at any point you notice that you lost focus on my voice and guidance just take a deep breath in,
Exhale any tension and any judgments about yourself are released.
Come back to observing your breath or feeling your fingers and toes.
A wandering mind is okay.
These things happen.
Just begin again with your training here in this meditation.
Focus and concentration are skills that can be trained and improved.
Let's practice together.
Visualize a candle.
The candle is standing upright on a surface and next to it is a box of matches.
Now visualize your hands taking the box of matches and opening them to take out one matchstick.
Take a moment to observe the wooden stick in your fingers.
Observe and focus on the color of the tip of the match and the feeling of the wood on your fingertips.
Now feel your hand holding the match and the other hand holding the box ready to strike the match to light it.
Breathe,
Relax,
Focus,
Concentrate and visualize lighting the match.
Now that your match is lit focus and concentrate on the candle.
Visualize your hand moving towards the candle to light it.
Whatever emotions or sensations arise in your body just breathe,
Let them flow and focus and concentrate on lighting the candle.
When your candle is lit you can take a slightly deeper inhale and imagine that your exhale is blowing out the match.
You can focus on putting the used match back inside of the matchbox and placing the box gently on the imaginary surface next to the candle.
You are in control of what you focus on.
You choose to practice your concentration and watch the flame of the candle.
Visualize the base of the flame,
Focus on where it starts on the wick,
The cord that runs through the center of the candle.
See the color of the base of the flame,
Indigo or bluish.
Notice how the color of the flame changes to red and yellow as you move up the flame.
Perhaps you can even see a tiny trail of smoke coming off the top of the flame.
Focus on any movements the flame is making and notice how your body is slowly loosening as the candle burns your body softens like the wax.
You release a little more control and relax as your muscles rest.
Be okay with letting go of control over your body as your seat or your surface supports you.
Concentrate on the sensations in your body,
Softness,
Looseness,
Relaxation,
A sense of calm.
As your body enjoys the sensations of feeling safe,
You can reassure yourself that you are taking the actions to improve your focus and concentration moment by moment,
Meditation by meditation.
If you choose to repeat this practice a few times each week,
You will begin to find it much easier to remember,
Much easier to focus and much easier to ignore anything that stops you from concentrating on your objectives.
As time passes,
You will be able to focus for longer and longer periods of time on any visualization or task at hand.
As you practice using this muscle of your mind,
It grows and strengthens.
I invite you to stay here watching the flame for as long as you like.
Whenever you feel you have spent enough time meditating,
You can blow the candle out and come back to the here and now.
If your alarm is due to go off shortly,
You will awaken from this deep focus,
Feeling clear and content.
And if you have no alarm,
You can choose to stay at peace and sleep deeply.
Thank you for the light you have brought to us.
Namaste
