Hello everyone and welcome to today's session.
Today we're going to go and start with some deep,
Relaxed breathing at your own pace,
Whether you want to do four by four breathing or just deep,
Deep breathing.
But go ahead and begin breathing deeply in through your nose and out through your mouth,
Holding if you feel comfortable doing so in between the inhale and the exhale.
And begin doing that and continue doing that for the next minute.
Now continue to do that deep breathing and make sure you are in a comfortable position,
Whether that's sitting or lying down,
Whatever works best for you.
If you feel comfortable with it,
Go ahead and soften your gaze or close your eyes,
Whichever is most comfortable.
And I want you to begin to imagine sitting on a shorefront,
Fine white grains of sand underneath you,
Not too hot,
Not too cold,
Just your ideal temperature for staring out and looking beyond the ocean and enjoying being present in that moment.
Imagine hearing the lapping of the waves on the beach,
Feeling the breeze along your skin,
The warmth of the sun.
Enjoy being present in this moment.
Now,
As you're imagining being on this beach,
Getting more and more comfortable,
I want you to think about all the stressors,
The discomforts you might be experiencing,
Currently or in this week or day.
Imagine those as stones sitting around you and weighing you down.
As you see these stones around you,
Go ahead and pick one of them up.
Look at it.
Recognize it for what it is.
Maybe it's a challenge you might have with your partner.
Maybe it is a stressor from working with your kids.
Whatever that stressor is,
Go ahead and recognize it for what it is,
Whether it is within or without your control.
And when you recognize it for what it is,
Go ahead and toss that stone into the ocean.
Hearing it splash and fade away.
As you do that,
You begin to feel lighter.
You feel yourself a little rising off the ground.
Now,
Go ahead and pick up the next stone.
Again,
Recognizing what it is,
How it might be weighing you down.
Maybe it is your way of thinking.
Maybe it's a conversation you've had recently that didn't end as well as you'd hoped.
But pay attention to that.
You can roll the stone around in your hand and see it from different angles,
Maybe looking at it from a different perspective.
After you've recognized it for what it is,
Go ahead and again throw it into the ocean.
Hearing it splash and watching it sink away.
And again,
You feel yourself becoming lighter.
You start to hover a little bit off the ground as you become less weighted down by the mental burdens in your life.
Continue to do this with the remaining stones around you,
Picking them up,
Recognizing them for what they are,
And then tossing them away,
No longer allowing them to burden you and weigh you down and giving you a feeling of being lighter,
More ethereal,
More positive.
Continue to do this as until all the stones around you are gone and you begin to drift up and float into the air.
Remember,
Some stones are small,
Some are larger.
Give each one the attention it deserves,
Not too much,
Not too little,
But recognizing it for what it is.
A really important part is paying attention to whether it is or is not within your control.
If it is,
Store that away in the back of your pocket.
It will be in your mind to think about later,
But don't let it continue to weigh you down at the moment.
As you continue to toss these stones into the ocean,
You feel yourself rising and floating off the ground,
Floating higher and higher,
And you start to expand your view.
You start to see beyond the horizon in increasing the visibility that you had before.
As we go through and remove the mental burdens in our life,
It allows us to see beyond that which was right in front of us and to view into the future,
Into what we want to do and what we want to do.
It allows us to focus on what we want to become rather than focusing on the things that might be weighing us down right now.
You may have many stones around you.
Each person has their own stones,
Their own volume,
Their own sizes,
Their own amounts.
But you individually have the power to recognize what that stone is,
Whether you have control over it or not,
And then you choose what to do with it,
Like tossing it into the ocean and allowing it not to burden you any further,
Or store it in the back of your mind for future planning if you do have control.
Now that you've unloaded the mental burdens that have sat around you,
You're floating up into the air,
Increasing your perspective and all the things you can see around you,
You start to notice other islands in the ocean that you hadn't seen before.
You see a very lush,
Green island full of vegetation and life.
From your new perspective,
You're able to go and appreciate that which is further than what you could see before.
As you're floating around,
You begin to appreciate the perspective that you've gained through clearing the clutter that might have been bothering you before.
Continue to enjoy this new mental perspective and all the visibility that it grants you.
Maybe you're seeing things in your future that you couldn't see before.
Maybe you're seeing things from your past that maybe you've forgotten that remind you of joy and happiness that you couldn't look at before.
Whatever has come from this positive situation,
Continue to bask in it and enjoy what it brings to you.
Now that you've gained perspective from your new elevated position,
I want you to imagine going and floating back down to that beach.
On the way down,
You see that lush island that was around.
You start to appreciate the landscape that surrounded that beach.
And while you're descending,
In your mind,
Use the phrase,
I have power.
I have control over what burdens me and what doesn't.
And repeat that going down as you reach the beach.
I have power.
I have control over what burdens me and what doesn't.
Continue repeating that until you reach the beach.
Now,
As you've reached the beach,
I want you to come back to your body,
Back to the present moment.
You can begin opening your eyes,
Wiggling your fingers and toes to come back.
But keep that phrase in mind as you come back and bring it with you for going forward.
I have power.
I have control over what burdens me and what doesn't.
And remember that as you go into your day.
I want to thank you all for joining me today.
Hopefully you've gained some insight into what burdens you and what you have control over.
Hope to see you next time.
Thank you and have a wonderful day.
