Welcome,
This is Allison with Mindful Pause Center,
And I'm so glad to bring you this practice today.
So just settling into the posture,
Giving yourselves time to notice.
What it feels like to make this transition.
Coming from,
You know,
Wherever you've been with however the mind was.
Maybe there was some kind of emotional event before you arrived to so the heart could be bringing something with it.
Body could be bringing something with it.
So we need some time.
Some time to settle,
To unwind.
Our attention is a little bit like antennae or feelers and we've had them out active.
Assessing,
Noticing.
Now we're turning that attention.
Inward to a much smaller space.
You might even,
With your eyes closed,
Just have a sense of the space right around you.
How your body is in relationship to that space.
That feels good.
You can just notice gravity.
This gentle tug.
Keeps us connected to our world.
Now I'm gonna invite you to bring your attention and awareness to the felt sense of the body breathing.
In this moment,
Not making any changes to the breath.
Just seeing what the breath is like as you arrive.
And where you notice that most tangibly.
Could be the belly.
Or the ribcage.
Could be in through the nose.
And as we pause here with this breath,
With this body breathing itself.
You might just notice how you're arriving.
And then as we turn to this intentional breathing practice,
There's an invitation to use our hands,
A kind of assistance that helps us work with the breath.
This is totally optional,
So not required.
If you'd like to try it,
I invite you to put your right hand on your belly,
Near your belly,
And your left hand on your chest.
And for the first breath.
You're going to really focus on the belly breathing.
So as you breathe in,
You should be noticing the hand on the belly expanding.
Moving away from the body.
And then on the exhalation,
The hand falls with the belly.
So in this first breath,
The left hand at the chest really shouldn't be moving at all.
And if it moves a little bit,
That's okay,
But really we're.
.
.
Wanting to bring the breath down there into the belly.
And if it helps to elongate the breath to make this work,
You're certainly welcome to do that.
And for this first breath.
You're welcome to follow my rhythm.
And then I'll invite you to follow your own.
So inhaling now down into the belly.
Exhaling.
Inhaling,
Feeling the hand rise.
Exhaling,
Feeling the hand fall.
Inhaling.
.
.
Exhaling.
And just a couple breaths on your own this way.
And then on your next exhale,
Letting the breath return to normal.
I'm going to take a minute for it to settle again.
Pause here.
And just notice if there was any effect of the breath.
On the mind.
Heart the body.
For the second breath.
The invitation shifts.
So now you're really focusing on that left hand and how much can the right hand on the belly remains still while the left hand rises as the lungs fill.
And the left hand senses the ribcage emptying beneath it.
So again,
If the right hand moves a little bit,
That's okay,
But we're really focusing now on drawing the breath up into the ribcage.
And exhaling,
Letting the lungs empty.
Inhaling,
The hand fills.
And exhaling,
The hand falls as the lungs empty.
Taking a few breaths this way at your own rhythm.
And at the end of the next exhalation,
Letting the breath return to normal.
And then being curious.
Checking the mind.
Heart,
Body,
Anything shift.
This last exercise where we draw the breath,
Not just up into the lungs,
But all the way into the clavicle.
So again,
The hand at the belly just kind of resting,
Letting it be still.
We'll notice as we do this breath that the hand at the chest will feel the lungs filling below it.
And then there'll be kind of a second inhalation you might need to take to pull the breath all the way up to the top.
Top of the lungs and the clavicle before you exhale.
So let's try this now.
Might help to exhale all the way first.
So inhaling into the ribs.
And further up to the top of the lungs.
Feeling the clavicle expand,
Exhaling out.
It helps to exhale through the mouth.
You might try that.
Inhaling.
All the way to the top of the lungs.
Exhaling.
Trying a few breaths this way on your own.
One more breath this way.
And at the bottom of the exhale,
Letting the breath return to normal.
You can release the hands as well.
Pausing again.
Has anything shifted?
A mind,
A heart.
The body.
You might just reflect in this final moment on.
Which of the breathing techniques you feel most drawn to.
Or most supported by in the way that they shifted things for you.
Or if there were challenges,
Just kind of bookmarking those.
And I'm beginning to move the body in a way that feels good.
So here,
This can be small movements first.
Maybe the hands.
Can become bigger.
You want to roll the neck or the shoulders.
There's the eyes open,
Doing our orientation practice where around the space that you're in,
The physical space.
There's some things about it,
Some forms,
Some colors.
Thank you for your practice.
Did you feel supported by this practice?
Leave a short word or phrase in the comments to let me know.
I'd love to be connected.
Until next time,
Take good care.
