My name is Larissa,
And we're going to practice together for about 15 minutes.
So take these first couple of moments just to check in with your body.
Do you have the right amount of support?
That wise balance of effort and ease?
I'm very often looking for a lot of ease in our body.
We know how to effort,
We know how to push ourselves into an upright position.
Very often it's looking for a little bit of ease.
Maybe you're in your most familiar posture,
Just check in.
Can my jaw soften?
Can my shoulders soften?
Those little notions,
Leaning forward a bit,
Sometimes brings us a bit more alertness,
Or a bit more awareness of our breath.
Sometimes leaning back a little bit gives us just that gentle softness that we're looking for.
And remembering there's no right or wrong.
This is guidance towards the wisdom of your body,
Rather than guidance towards a past version of you,
How you normally get ready for meditation.
Or even guidance from my words themselves,
Their invitations.
But it's really this invitation to look.
My body knows.
My body knows exactly what to do.
Very often my mind is seeking patterns from the past,
Trying to predict the future from those past patterns.
But right here I'm just present with my body,
With my breath.
There are no shoulds or supposed tos.
There's nobody looking for a result at the end of this meditation,
Except perhaps different parts of my mind.
Which is why we look for this stability in our body,
So we can invite our minds to rest here too.
And then from your base to the crown of your head,
Just looking,
Where are the places where I feel support and stability the most?
Is it the ground beneath you?
Perhaps a chair beneath you?
Is it your cushion,
Your blanket,
Whatever it is that's supporting you?
All the way up to the crown of your head,
Your neck supporting you,
Your core supporting you.
And then from your crown of your head,
Back down to your feet,
Looking for places where you can soften a bit.
It's your forehead,
The soft skin around your eyes,
Your jaw,
Your shoulders,
Your chest as you exhale,
Notice the softening.
It's allowing freedom of movement in your abdomen as you breathe in and out,
Not restricting,
And not forcing,
Just allowing.
Is there any tension that you can soften in your legs,
In your calves,
In your feet?
It's finding that balance of full support,
But also freedom of movement,
Letting your breath move through you,
And letting your body be fully held by gravity.
And it's from this ground of being present in your body that we can start to look at what our mind is doing.
So we always begin with this being with practice,
Being with body,
Letting our focal point be our body.
Your body is always present,
It's your mind that moves.
And so from this being with focal point,
We can eventually start to move into a working with meditation,
Working with our mind.
Remembering the being with,
That simple form of just noticing your breath move,
Noticing what parts of your body are being held by the earth,
Going back to that stability again and again and again.
Especially when our mind is a little sticky,
A particular thought,
A particular emotion continues to come in waves.
We're never trying to resist.
The more we resist,
The more energy we give it,
The more we start to cultivate mind,
Instead of this invitation to just drop back down into your body.
Sometimes just noticing,
Oh yeah,
There's thinking mind.
There's a softness in that.
And in that softness,
Sometimes we can gently unhook from the thought for a moment,
Rather than trying to push it away.
Oh yeah,
There's thinking.
Here's my breath.
Here's my feet touching the floor.
Just noticing again,
This sensation in your body,
Your breath,
The parts of you being held.
The parts of you that have freedom to move.
And from that steady place,
That presence in your body,
Just bring some curiosity.
Do I notice where my thoughts are headed?
Sometimes we can start to notice trends and patterns,
And a little label can be so helpful.
It's like,
Oh yeah,
I'm future-oriented today.
And there's a particular story from yesterday my mind keeps returning to.
And there's this subtle difference between reflection and rumination.
As we reflect to remember the joys,
To learn something,
It's like,
Oh yeah,
Now I know that the feeling from that meeting yesterday didn't feel so good.
How can I do it different next time?
There's wise reflection versus,
Gosh,
I can't believe I said that,
And then we repeat that a hundred more times.
That turns into rumination.
And these are just patterns of mind.
So when we notice the pattern,
We interrupt it for a moment.
We have all of these positive disruptors,
Like taking a deep breath,
Refreshing our present awareness.
But to work with our thoughts very often requires our tender curiosity.
We start to notice patterns and loops and habits in our mind.
And rather than trying to judge them,
We just witness them.
And the more we witness them,
The more we interrupt that particular habit,
Which is one of the major parts of habit change.
It's interrupting our cues and routines that put us into these habit loops.
And it's the smallest,
Gentlest interruption.
Oh,
There's a thought.
And that becomes this little softening to the thought itself.
Ooh,
I was caught in a story.
Now that I'm aware of that,
I can receive and appreciate this breath again.
And notice,
Just in this moment,
If there were thoughts headed somewhere,
Were they future or past?
Just that little label can be so helpful just to come back to present again.
You can also offer other labels,
Getting to know your thought patterns.
Like,
Ooh,
That was a worry loop.
Ooh,
That was an excitement loop.
That was a story repetition.
It helps you get to know yourself.
But always with curiosity.
And when you notice judgment,
Come back to your body,
Because very often judgment causes a tension.
A tension.
Tension in the body.
And then you get to tend to your body again,
Rather than trying to figure out the thought or the judgment with more thinking.
It's just this breath right here.
Can I feel it move through my body?
And suddenly I'm present again.
And I'm just going to share a very brief part of a poem from Mary Oliver.
It's called I Worried.
And she starts by saying,
I worried a lot.
Will the garden grow?
Will the river flow?
Will the rivers flow in the right direction?
Will the earth turn as it was taught?
And if not,
How shall I correct it?
She's just naming this worry loop in her mind.
And towards the end of the poem she says,
Finally I saw all of that worrying had come to nothing,
And I gave it up.
I took my old body and went out into the morning and sang.
And with that I'll invite you to bring your hands into any of your closing habits or practices.
And we'll end with a few loving kindness phrases.
Just repeating these phrases back as they make sense for you.
May I give myself permission to simply go out into the morning As I go out,
May I give myself permission to just be myself.
When I notice loops in my mind,
May I be gentle with myself.
When action is needed today,
May I choose to move with ease and peace.
And may the merits of our practice ripple out to benefit all beings.
Just taking a moment to thank yourself whenever you feel complete,
Finding a little movement.
And as always,
Thank you for being here,
For supporting each other,
For being here.
