Welcome to Mindful Spacious Awareness Meditation.
Taking a moment to get into a position that is alert and at ease.
When you feel ready,
Allowing the eyes to gently close or unfocusing your gaze.
Releasing all the doing and coming into being.
Dropping into the body and feeling the breath in the body now.
Placing your attention wherever you feel your breath the most in the body.
Allowing the gentle ebb and flow of the breath.
As you feel the breath in the body,
Noticing the inhale expanding the body.
Slight pause and on exhale contraction.
Continuing to witness the body breathing itself.
Allowing the sense of the present moment to arrive.
Releasing awareness on the breath and opening up the awareness to the whole body here now.
Feeling into the body,
Maybe starting with the feet,
Moving up the legs,
Torso,
Arms,
Shoulders,
Neck and head.
Or maybe noticing somewhere in the body that is asking for your attention now.
Placing your awareness there.
So explore the sensations in the body.
Being with whatever is here,
Noticing any tendency to move toward a sensation or away.
And seeing if you can just notice.
Judgment shows up,
Maybe using thank you,
Not now.
And if there is an area most calling for attention,
Exploring this,
Where is the sensation?
Where is the center?
It's outermost boundary.
Just sensing in with a curiosity.
Exploring here and learning what is present now.
Now seeing if you can shift the attention to the body's boundary.
Inside the body right before it switches to outside the body.
The outline of the body here now.
And then deciding when it is right for you to place the attention just outside the body.
Still exploring the contour of the body just outside the outline of the body.
And if at any time this feels like too much,
Feel free to rejoin attention with your breath.
If your attention is outside your body's boundary now,
Exploring the room you find yourself in.
Just with your awareness,
Exploring this room above you,
Below you,
In front of you.
And to the sides.
Now expanding the awareness to the building in which this room is located.
Exploring different floors or rooms,
The entire building in which this room that you find yourself is located.
Expanding the awareness now from the building to the town you are in.
Here again,
If any of this seems too much for you today,
It's okay.
The practice is in knowing when to return to the breath.
If you're here in the town in which you find yourself,
Expanding now to the state.
Taking your awareness broader even to the country in which you find yourself.
And then zooming out to see the world below and the endless spacious awareness of the sky.
Noticing in the sky no end and no beginning.
Endless spacious awareness.
Noticing in this spaciousness a sense of things coming and going.
Maybe even imagining clouds in the sky coming in and passing through.
I'll go silent for a bit to allow you time in this spaciousness.
Continuing to be in this vastness.
Maybe even noticing a lightness all your own.
Here in this spaciousness,
All that we hold so tight has room to be.
Within your own time,
Deciding when you're ready.
Feeling free to go beneath these words if you would like to stay in this spaciousness longer.
Now bringing into focus the earth.
Maybe taking a moment of loving kindness for all of those on the earth.
Now bringing into focus the country in which you find yourself.
Gradually closing the awareness to the country itself.
Holding a sense of loving kindness for those in your country.
Now imagining the state you find yourself in.
Closing the awareness further to the building in which you find yourself now.
Finding your room in this building and yourself here.
Sensing the awareness just outside your body's outermost boundary.
And maybe on an inhale,
Imagine coming into the body fully.
Now sensing the body here,
Seated or lying.
Feeling the ebb and flow of each breath.
I invite you at the sound of the bell to open your eyes or focus your gaze before moving your body with intention to take with you the spacious awareness long past your meditation.
And now the sound of the bell.
