Heart Meditation

This is a guided meditation practice to explore the heart channels in the body through the heart, eyes and limbs. In the practice you will be offered some helpful cues to invite more tranquility and compassion into the body and learn how to slow the thoughts and chatter of the mind to hear the continuous sound of the Anahata Naad. There are moments of silence with the ambience of the night and you will know the practice has been completed when I thank you for joining me in the practice.

Transcript

Come to a comfortable seated position,

Being mindful to make sure that you will be here for a period of time and to ensure the body is comfortable and steady.

You might need to adjust your seat or legs so that you can be somewhat still for the next 30 minutes.

If it's comfortable,

You can choose to close your eyes now.

If you'd prefer to keep them open,

Just soften the edges,

Relaxing the gaze and maybe looking down at the floor one to two meters in front of you.

I invite you to come into your breath,

Find a comfortable spot to feel into your breath.

Let go of the day,

Know that you will be here for the next 30 minutes.

Allow yourself to feel into the sensation of being here in stillness and with the commitment to try and be as present as possible.

Feel into the lower half of your body,

Grounding down from the lower base below hips,

Down through your legs and into the feet.

Let your whole lower half become heavy and stable,

Resting into being here.

Allow your torso to become spacious and let the breath fill gently.

Keep your spine upright and settle into this structure of upright but spaciousness in the body.

Bring your awareness to your breath,

Finding comfort and ease in its movement.

Bring your awareness into the space of the body.

We will explore the many ways we can experience the energy of the heart in the body.

We will begin in the center of the chest,

We're referring to the anahata,

Which means the unstruck sound.

We also refer to this space in the center of the chest as the heart chakra or heart energy space.

The anahata sound emanates from this center.

Anahata nād is the unstruck,

The mystic sound that occurs spontaneously and is not the result of striking or being,

Depending upon the intensity of your concentration and the level of your mental purity or capabilities of being in samadhi will depend if you can hear this sound.

Hearing the sound is not the goal,

But simply knowing that there is this connecting pure sound emanating from your being,

Unconditional love,

A vibration that radiates through all beings that arose spontaneously and resounds throughout the universe.

Sit with the knowing that there is this unconditional sound resonance moving through you at all times.

Slowly and surely we will continue to still the mind,

Calming the thoughts and focusing our awareness on this heart center.

Over time we might start to connect with the anahata nād,

The sound of the anahata,

But there is no pressure and no desire to get there sooner than whenever we arrive.

Rest your attention in this heart space.

From this space there is unlimited potential for our actions to be motivated by love and do the kindest work in the world.

From the heart move your attention up through the spine into the neck,

Moving up into the eyes.

Notice the feeling in your eyes.

Allow the musculature around your eyes to soften,

Letting the balls of your eyes sink even heavier into the head.

Notice if you can feel softness in your eyelids,

So they begin to drape over the eyes like soft curtains rather than tightly bound roller blinds pulled over your eyes.

Move the attention back from the eyes down the neck into the heart.

Notice how you feel in the heart.

Try to soften this heart space even more.

Every inhale fills the space making more room.

Every exhale releases tension around the chest space,

Softening any resistance and allowing the new space to be light and airy.

Move your attention back to the eyes and notice if there's an even softer sensation in the eyes.

See if you can relax all the muscles around the back,

The sides and the edges towards the front of the eye.

And then notice the feeling as you move your attention back into the heart.

How does your heart feel?

Is there softness?

Is there space?

And can you start to sense the connection between the heart and the eyes?

When there is tension or stress in the heart,

The eyes start to tense and stress and the muscles can be restricted or tightened around the eyes.

Notice if you can move your attention between the two,

Creating more softness,

More space,

More of a feeling of flow from the heart to the eyes,

From the eyes to the heart.

Recognizing the prana vayu moves through the senses,

Including the eyes through what we see and draws the prana into the heart.

So moving to soften this channel between eyes to heart,

Heart to eye,

To allow a free flow of energy,

Of softness.

When you're ready,

Take your attention back to the heart,

Focusing on your exhale,

Let the mind be pacified with every slow and steady breath out.

You won't need to try to change the breath,

Just notice how much longer it is and it will naturally start to slow even more.

From the heart,

Move your attention into the palms.

Through the palms,

There are mama points that lead from the palm back to the heart.

The talahedra mama point is located in the heart of your palm.

Just noticing how,

As we rest our attention here,

How does it feel for that awareness?

Are there sensations?

Are there no sensations?

Is there pressure,

Numbness?

Remembering that even the absence of sensation is still a sensation.

Whatever you're noticing as it arises,

Just labeling it,

Whatever the sensation and continuing to observe and see if it stays the same or changes.

You might also notice if you can feel any fluctuating or dissipating,

Or maybe the sensations are growing,

Paying attention to the fluctuation or the changes that you're experiencing.

And if new sensations arrive,

Just labeling them,

Observing,

Witnessing their behavior.

When you're ready,

Taking your attention into the soles of your feet.

Up near the top third of your foot,

Approximately towards the middle is another talahedra point on both feet.

You don't need to know the exact location to just sense into the feeling in your feet.

Just dropping your awareness into this space and observing anything that arises.

Again labeling sensations and observing.

Again you might notice fluctuating or if sensations are dissipating or perhaps increasing,

Growing.

Or maybe there's none.

Maybe one foot has one and then the other foot has a completely different or no sensation.

We are just listening and observing to our body and the experience we are having.

Every practice where you sit to observe will feel different and you may have different sensations from moment to moment and definitely from practice to practice.

When you're ready,

You might just notice the attention from the feet pulling back into the heart,

Tracing a vague pathway back to the heart.

On your next exhale,

Running from the heart down the arms into the talahedra point in the palm.

As you inhale from the palm into the soles of the feet,

Continuing to breathe with every part of the breath moving you back between the heart to each limb.

Circulating from the heart to the hands,

The hands to the feet,

Or feet to the hands,

Hands to the heart.

Keep moving your attention with every breath,

Traveling through the body,

Experiencing this flow of prana,

Of breath,

Of life from the heart into those talahedra mama points.

Now dropping that pathway and just letting your breath return you back to the center of the heart.

Can you take your awareness into the front of the heart?

The very outer edge of the chest.

And can you take your attention into the back of the heart?

Right at the very back of the body.

And can you notice with every breath how it feels to sit in this space,

Watching,

Observing and allowing whatever arises and whatever falls to continue moving as it needs to.

When you're ready,

Bringing your attention back into the heart center.

This time moving the attention into the eyes.

From the eyes moving them out to the hands,

From the hands out to the feet.

Moving from the feet all the way up the limbs of the legs back to the heart and around through to the eyes.

Continue moving eyes,

Hands,

Feet back through the heart to the eyes again.

When you're,

When you're,

When you're,

When you're,

When you're,

When you're,

When you're,

When you're,

When you're,

When you're ready dropping that focus and returning back to the heart space and letting the breath be the main focus.

Staying with the exhale,

Softening.

Noticing how long and smooth and subtle your breath is naturally.

It doesn't matter about any other time you've had a smooth soft exhale,

Just now notice the exhale as it is.

Noticing all the qualities that feel helpful to cultivate tranquility,

Calmness,

Steadiness.

You might,

You might,

You might take your attention into the belly allowing there to be softness in the belly breath movement.

Although no breath moves into the belly,

The belly makes space for the lungs to fully expand.

The flexibility of the belly around the breath is a compassionate movement every time.

Just notice this natural way the belly moves with the breath.

From here you may notice how there is a calm softness in your whole body,

But still fortitude and structure in your frame.

These two qualities of fluidity and structure can exist in harmony and benefit each other.

In the same way the Anahata sound is unstruck,

But resonates through all beings at all times.

This compassionate,

Unchanging,

Permanent inequality is there.

You just need to allow stillness and tranquility into the mind and body so that we can start to try and listen patiently if we can catch just a glimpse of this unstruck sound.

When you are ready to close the practice,

Just allow your breath to become a little bit more purposeful.

Some people will like to rub the palms together just to generate some heat.

Once you've got warm palms you might cover your eye sockets,

Resting the fingers on top of the head.

You might blink the eyes open gently and then eventually allow yourself to open the eyes and adjust to the light in the room.

You can stay here for as many breaths as it feels helpful to do so.

And take all the time in the world to come back to the room and space and continue with your day or your evening.

Thank you so much for joining me in the practice.