When Everything Shifts, Sit With What You Love

When life feels like it’s moving faster than you can keep up — when the ground beneath you seems to shift and you can’t tell what’s solid anymore — this meditation offers grounding.
Through slow and steady guidance, you’ll identify what really matters to you. You'll practice sitting with these things AND all the feelings that arise as you share space.

Use this meditation when:
• You feel disoriented by change or loss.
• You’re in transition and unsure what to hold onto.
• Life feels chaotic, unpredictable, or overwhelming.
• You need to remember that your true anchor is within.
Together, we affirm that you don’t have to hold everything together. You practice loving something, even as it feels like the love is shifting.
The slow and quiet may be disorienting at first---which is normal. Listening to the track a few times a week during significant adjustment periods or major changes will foster a sense of acceptance and peace even though the outside world feels hectic.

Transcript

This is a meditation on the inevitability of change and loss. So settle in. You don't need to arrange yourself into anything impressive or even change how you are. Just notice that your body is most likely being held by something. A chair, The floor, The wall, The bed, Quiet gravity of the earth. Begin by noticing your breath. It's not a task. More so, Your breath is a companion that has been with you all along. Just be aware of it and inhale and exhale. You don't have to try to improve it or fix it. Just let it be exactly what it is while you pay attention to it. There may be a part of you that is restless or scanning or trying to solve something or maybe you are ready to get to the next thing or know that you've got some tasks to get accomplished or maybe you just are stuck and confused on how to hold on to what you love, What you value, What matters to you or how to prepare for what might be lost or is on its way at all. Notice those parts without pushing them away, Without gussying them up either. Trust that those parts are trying to protect you and the only way they know how. Okay, So bring your attention back to your breathing. Inhale, Feel the air enter. Cool. Hopefully quiet. Exhale and feel the release, The body letting go even just a little. Imagine for a moment now that you are sitting beside everything you love. Take a minute to see what's there. Maybe as you hear that again, Everything that you love and you sitting in the same space, Maybe things or people or places, Even energies might pop into your visual field. What do you value? Even the little things. Most people who are close to me know that I love, Love, Love my popcorn maker. So find the things that you cherish, Something that you wear, Maybe a quote, Maybe a color. Notice that you're not clinging to the things you love. You're not bracing. You're just sitting beside them. Maybe it's a person. Maybe a memory is there too. Maybe it's like a memory is at the center of the table or a few of them are. Maybe it's a version of your life. Maybe it's part of your physical appearance or something you really treasure about your character. Maybe it's even something right now that is about your own changing, Maybe vulnerable or fragile or tenuous self. So many of us in the moment we can struggle to come up with like, What do I love? What am I devoted to or what do I really care about? So this is your space to bring them all here. Or if you, You could come back to this time and after time and add and subtract. So now that you've got some of your most beloved things, Sit with them. What do you want to say to them? Maybe there's one thing or two things you have something to say. If you are like me and sometimes don't know or don't have the words that really express what you're feeling or sensing, Perhaps just say you are here and I'm here with you. Breathe that in. Notice that you don't need to promise these things forever. Notice that you don't need to secure it against time. Breathe that in. And if a feeling arises like tenderness or a wave of sadness or gratitude or even fear or worry, Concern, Just let that feeling come. It's snuggled right up next to your affection, Appreciation, Your enamored heart. You don't have to sort those feelings out. You don't have to name them correctly. Your emotions are not problems to solve. They're not signs that anything is amuck or has gone astray. Sometimes they are simply weather passing through. Notice how the breath continues even as it shifts, Even as everything else shifts. The breath is both a fishing line and an anchor. Not because it stops change, But because it moves with it. Now gently consider this. What if nothing you love, Nothing can be made permanent and nothing needs to be for this moment to completely matter? Let that question just rest in you and move with your breath. It doesn't need an answer. Here's the invitation to stay present anyway. That choice often comes with the consequence of evoking courage. Not the loud, Dramatic, Lioness kind of courage, But the small, Steady kind that says, I will not turn away from my life, From the loves of my life. If your mind wanders, That's all right. Each return to the breath is a kind of devotion. Each moment you notice and come back to the things that you love, That you have brought here with you is a soft yes to being you, Who you are today, To being alive. Bring one hand to your belly. Feel the rise. Follow the fall beneath that palm of yours. This is your life happening in real time, Not later, Not before, Not when things are secure or safer or clear now. And here you can offer yourself permission. I don't have to hold everything together. I don't have to understand it all now. I don't have to know when it will end or I don't have to know how it ends. I'm allowed to be here, Loving what I am present with. Stay here for a few more breaths. Inhale and exhale. You may choose, If it brings you courage or comfort, To carry this with you. Not as something to remember perfectly, But as something you can return to again and again. You are here, Here. You are alive. You are present with the things that you love. And for this moment, That is enough.