Welcome,
This is Allison with Mindful Pause Center,
And I'm so glad to bring you this practice today.
So choosing a posture,
Just checking out,
You know,
Like,
Is your back supported enough?
Where are the hands as we start?
Do you feel like you have a sense both of resting back and also some alertness?
You can adjust the posture a little bit to try to find that balance between feeling upright or awake,
Maybe that's another way to say it,
And also relaxed.
Just transitioning into the posture through gravity,
Feeling that gentle tug,
And not trying to resist it when we are up and going about our day.
Usually,
There's this tension with gravity,
You're often acting against it,
As we need to move forward or get things done.
At this point right now,
We can let gravity be our guide,
Just releasing some of that striving energy.
You might think about resting back and down.
And you might be noticing as you do this,
Where your energy level is at this moment,
Whether it's feeling restless,
Frenetic,
Or maybe it's feeling dull,
Tired,
Sleepy.
Maybe there's a balance and an openness.
Just taking note and having established something of a foundation,
However that is tonight.
Choosing an anchor,
A home base for yourself.
What will support you,
Given how you're arriving?
Will it be something about the body,
Maybe gravity,
Maybe a specific part of the body,
Like the feet?
Or you can also see how the breath is tonight.
Do you notice the body breathing itself?
Can this be a place of comfort tonight?
And you can also investigate sound,
Using hearing as a way to stabilize and find support.
And trusting yourself as best you're able to go to the home base that you need in this moment.
And letting this be the place you come back to at any time in the practice,
If you start feeling overly agitated or starting to numb out.
And this cultivation practice that we'll now experiment with,
I invite you to try.
Cultivating is a way of trying to bring forward some state,
In this case kindness,
That we would long to turn into a trait.
So that means when we're cultivating,
We're working either with something small or something new.
So not all of these hand poses will work for you.
And the invitation is to notice how they feel.
And to gain some awareness about which ones can support you in an ongoing way.
So I invite you to start placing one hand at the belly and one at the heart.
You can experiment with how much pressure or how little pressure you use.
And see if you can imagine sending through your hands a sense of care and presence.
Maybe the way you would like to show up for a friend who's in need.
Just noticing how this feels.
And the second pose is to have both hands at the heart.
And seeing how this feels.
Going back to your home base at any point.
Now bringing both hands to the belly.
Still as much of a sense of care and presence through the hands as you can bring.
It helps imagining how you would show up for a friend or a loved one.
And sending that care through the hands.
And now one hand on the cheek.
And you might like to do both hands.
Or maybe you find that you just prefer the one.
You can even explore what it feels like to let the cheek lean into the hand.
Noticing the impact.
Does it bring more sense of groundedness,
More sense of support or less?
And just a couple more.
This time we'll put both hands around our arms like we're giving ourselves a hug.
And again,
You can moderate how much or little pressure.
Change the location on the arms.
And second to the last one,
One hand at the heart.
Just making small circles or maybe a gentle back and forth rubbing.
Just adding in some small little bit of motion here at the heart.
And just noticing again the impact.
Is there comfort here?
Is there awkwardness here?
And then finally letting the hand at the heart be still again.
And taking the other hand and just opening it,
Extending it outward to the world.
So my palm is near my thighs.
And the sense here is of like taking in some of that comfort toward myself,
But also at the same time sending some care out.
How does this feel?
How does it impact your willingness to be present?
And no right or wrong answers,
Just information to take in.
Then you can let the hands go.
You can either return them to a particular posture that you really felt supported by,
Or you could let them rest in your lap.
Just noticing now what it was like to use these postures to explore the possibility of cultivating care and kindness.
What did it feel like to do this practice?
Was it beneficial or challenging?
And then as you're ready to end the practice,
Beginning to move the body in a way that feels good.
Anything you might need to do to work out the kinks.
And as your eyes open,
Orienting to the space in the way that we do to end the practice.
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.
