I'm just taking a little bit of time to settle into your body here.
As you're getting situated,
Settling in,
Making little adjustments,
Just wiggling your torso so your seat can settle just a little heavier into your cushion,
Making some neck rolls,
Taking a couple of deep breaths.
So all of these are little physical modalities that we work with every single day in our meditation,
Just to find the right amount of comfort and support so that we can stay for a while.
And as you stay,
There's a hundred tools that we could work with.
But part of our meditation is just a simple concentration practice,
Just returning to ourself a hundred times,
A million times if needed.
And that returning to yourself,
Just practicing returning to yourself with gentleness,
With curiosity,
And the place of returning,
Your body,
Just looking for safety,
Comfort,
And support within your body.
So where do you notice right now in your body that you feel grounded and stable?
If you haven't already done so,
You're welcome to close your eyes.
Just turn your gaze downward so that your eyes are not moving.
That often helps us look within.
So where do you feel a bit of stability?
Can we quite literally?
Stability beneath you?
The consistency of your breath moving in and out?
The stability within you might even be an intention that you set.
Intending to be kind and curious.
Intending to witness your inner voice as it speaks to you,
And invite in curiosity and kindness.
That literal stability in your body is a place to return to.
It's quite literally noticing the firm foundation beneath you,
Returning to this firm foundation,
This remembrance that you always have support.
It can also return to the consistency and yet the constantly shifting and changing movement of your breath.
So where do you feel your breath moving right now?
What are the subtleties of it?
Can you notice your clothing shift ever so slightly as you breathe in?
Can you notice what parts of yourself in as you breathe out?
The foundation beneath you is always with you.
Breath moving through you,
Always with you.
It's not something you ever need to question.
Anytime our mind moves into questioning,
Or we land in a difficult moment emotionally,
Or a thought is bringing us some future worry or some past regret,
Anytime we notice that happening,
That is also a kind of stability,
Just to witness it.
We don't have to be bowled over by the waves that our thoughts bring,
But it also doesn't mean we have to resist those waves.
We're just staying with ourselves,
With as much curiosity and kindness as we can.
As many times as needed,
Returning to the stability beneath you,
The stability within you,
The consistency of your breath,
And yet the reminder that comes with your breath that everything is always changing.
Just witnessing again your breath moving in and out.
Anytime you need a little refresher,
Just take a deeper breath,
Let your ribs expand a bit more,
And then sighing out the exhale.
There's so many ways to use your breath,
But that sigh out or consciously slowing down your exhale is such a simple way to help turn on your calming systems.
Just noticing,
Where do I feel my breath right now?
It's breath by breath,
Moment by moment,
Present awareness.
And noticing the simplest things,
The steadiness beneath you,
That stillness,
That deep stillness that we invite ourselves into.
And as we invite in this stillness,
It invites our mind to slowly settle as well.
Seeking continuously your own curiosity and kindness in the stillness.
That when a difficult thought or our inner critic starts to speak to us,
We can witness it.
We don't have to resist it or fix it,
Just witness it.
And that action of witnessing helps us know how to tend to ourselves.
It also takes us a step removed from the thought itself,
From getting wrapped up in a story about a feeling,
And instead just feeling the feeling itself.
It's like we're practicing feeling.
Yeah,
I can feel that ever so subtle shift on my one shoulder as I take a deep breath.
I can feel this slight change in the touch of my clothing as I breathe out.
As we practice that kind of curiosity with feeling our breath,
I can bring that same kind of curiosity to any sensation.
A strong emotion,
A thought that brings a thousand questions.
And we just witness and just for a moment have peace.
So yeah,
There's thinking happening.
Here's breathing happening.
Take a deep breath and sigh it out whenever you need a refresher.
If the intensity of sensation that comes requires a bit more intensity of curiosity or intensity of concentration,
Just use your body to match that.
Rub your palms together,
Creating some friction in order to move some energy so that you can settle into stillness again.
You might make neck rotations or wiggle your spine or just rub your hands across your legs looking for sensation to help you be present again.
So remembering that stillness is one of our tools,
But it doesn't have to be every tool.
Just meeting yourself moment by moment,
Giving yourself permission to be,
Giving yourself permission to feel whatever comes up.
And inviting your mind to rest in a gentle place within your body,
A place of curiosity and kindness.
Perhaps even imagining you're nestled right between your heart and lungs in this incredibly warm space.
Knowing how soothing heart is for our nervous system.
And just being with your own.
Noticing again a breath.
Sometimes that is enough just to notice,
Oh yeah,
That's right,
I'm just noticing my breath.
Sometimes we're in a moment of reflection that accidentally turns into rumination or judgment.
And that's the moment where we might need a deeper breath and a sigh out.
Or rubbing our palms together to create a new sensation just to bring us back to present.
And then settling into stillness,
Noticing that space between breaths,
Those little peace pockets.
And it doesn't mean we're trying to get to a peaceful moment.
But remembering that that peaceful moment already exists.
It's right here.
There's nothing I need to change about myself nor acquire in life for me to feel these moments of peace.
Or even deserve these moments of peace.
That's a word that we use in our language.
And we might say,
Oh,
I deserve better.
Or we might say,
I deserve a treat.
And somehow we line up these moments of joy as deserving or undeserving,
Instead of just moments that exist.
Like,
Did I work hard enough to enjoy this moment of rest?
Did I do enough to give myself this treat?
And somehow we remove ourselves from the present moment for some future version,
Or we accidentally get stuck in rumination about the past.
But just to be here,
It's a skill we cultivate.
And perhaps a better phrase is,
It's a skill we remember.
Because all of our bodies,
These soft animal bodies that we get to exist within,
Our bodies remember who we are at our heart.
It's our nature of curiosity,
Our nature of reciprocity and connection.
And so we just land in our body a hundred times,
A million times.
So yeah,
There's thinking happening.
Maybe just noticing the thinking is enough.
Maybe I need to take a deep breath.
But I'm just inviting myself to return to my present moment within my body,
Because my body is always present.
And it's just right here.
And my breath is never worried about,
Do I deserve or do I not deserve anything at all?
My breath just gives me the gift of life.
My body processes this breath,
Knowing exactly what to do with it.
And I just get to receive.
Can you just notice a breath again?
And there's a quote from one of the Buddhist suttas,
I can't recall which right now,
But the story is told in many suttas.
The version I remember,
It's this idea that a wisely directed mind is our truest friend.
And the story is talking about a monk going about his business,
Tending to the garden,
Nourishing his body,
Taking time to contemplate and appreciate nature.
And as he did so,
Appreciating his own body,
Because his own body is nature.
And some conflict arose.
That's the part I don't quite recall.
Some conflict arose.
And he continued in his direction of seeking the good and receiving the goodness.
And one of the other monks was frustrated with him,
That he wouldn't continue an argument.
And the wisdom that came out of that little story is a wisely directed mind is your truest friend.
A chaotic mind can be your greatest enemy.
So as we take these moments to befriend ourselves,
We take this time in meditation just to be still with the whole of who we are,
Our flaws,
Our quirks,
Our delights,
Our lovingness,
Our irritations.
Just be with yourself fully in this body that's literally made of earth,
Of the food I consumed,
Of the sunshine my skin absorbs.
The billions of particles of oxygen that my body has processed and then given back as a gift of gases for the grasses to re-then exchange back into oxygen.
This body that we exist within that knows how to breathe for us has so much wisdom we can learn from.
This body is always in the present,
Always wisely directed here.
It's our mind that moves,
Sometimes gets a little chaotic,
Sometimes gets a little off the path.
But no matter where our mind is headed,
No matter how we feel,
Your breath is just right here.
That tiny moment of peace between thoughts is not separate from you,
And you never need to prove yourself or deserve it.
Your body will just continue breathing for you,
Taking care of you,
And you can trust that gravity will still stay and hold you steady,
That your body will breathe for you.
And just rest in that for a moment.
We have little parts of us that will continue to invite us in to regurgitate a story or accidentally get stuck in rumination when we're trying to reflect.
And those parts of us need tenderness and love as well.
We need to just notice it.
My mind is inviting me into some old known chaos.
Can I stay with the steadiness of my breath instead,
Just for this moment?
Not trying to push away that thought.
I'm not trying to make it wrong.
Just returning to the steadiness of gravity.
And from this place of steadiness,
I can witness my thoughts roll and move and shift and change.
Just like that story,
Someone trying to pull us into their conflict.
Can we just pause,
And not push away their pain,
But just witness them in it,
Without needing to get pulled into our own or others' stories about what's happening?
Can we just feel what's happening?
And it's a practice.
It's a moment-by-moment practice.
So I'll invite you to bring your hand over your heart,
Maybe stack the other one on top.
And just notice your hands on your heart for a moment.
Notice this nature body that you get to exist within.
It's animated by your breath,
By your beautiful ideas,
And by this heart that sits underneath your hands,
Steadily beating.
We'll end,
As we often do,
With a few loving-kindness phrases.
But I'll share here first a quote from Diane Ackerman.
This is from her book,
A History of Your Senses.
She says,
We can't enchant the world,
Which already makes its own magic.
But we can enchant ourselves by paying deep attention.
So just invite us into that,
This deep curiosity that possibly even turns into enchantment,
Such deep awe and reverence for this body that knows what to do with one molecule of oxygen,
And turns it into life for each one of us.
Let's repeat these phrases back as they make sense for you,
These loving-kindness phrases.
May I bring deep reverence and appreciation to my body.
May I appreciate moments of pause between breaths today.
May I remember the innate goodness of my breath.
And as I take action,
May I choose to move with ease and peace.
And finally,
An offering to all beings.
May the merits of our practice ripple out to benefit all beings.
And go slow if you can.
Just whenever you feel complete,
You'll find a little movement in your body.
Take a moment to thank yourself.
Thank your body for holding you.
Thank yourself just for showing up.
As always,
Thank you for being here.
Thanks for supporting each other.
