Our normal daily awareness can feel quite narrow and contracted,
Especially when we're stressed or anxious.
And our sense of awareness influences our entire perspective on life and how we respond to life.
Simply expanding your awareness can start to broaden your perspective on life and help you to respond to life a little more objectively.
I learned this fun practice from Jevon D'Angeli and it's called the Jumi Tree Meditation.
It allows your awareness to expand out and enjoy a greater sense of spaciousness and possibly even shifting your perspective on life.
So as we begin,
Take some time to get yourself comfortable.
Sitting up straight is beneficial but if you can't that's okay and you don't need to hold yourself tightly straight.
You can be relaxed and natural.
If you want to,
You can gently close your eyes and gradually give yourself some time to settle into the meditation.
During the practice I'll give you some guidance and then I'll leave some spaces of silence.
These are to allow you to deepen into your experience and notice how it is for you in the moment instead of listening to me talk.
So gradually drawing your awareness in away from the outside world towards yourself,
Into your body and down into your belly.
Noticing the rise and fall of your belly as you breathe.
Allow your awareness to rest there,
Noticing all the subtleties and nuances of feelings and sensations in your belly with each in-breath and each out-breath.
To encourage the parasympathetic system and relaxation,
Let's do a few deep breaths together.
Take a deep breath in through the nose and strict the bottom of your throat a little and let your breath come out slowly through your nose,
Extending out the exhale and feeling your body relax as you breathe out.
You can keep doing that in your own time for a bit.
A deep breath in through the nose,
Gently constrict the throat and let a long slow breath come out through the nose,
Relaxing and settling each time.
And now breathing naturally,
Rest your awareness deeply into the belly again for a few moments.
Allow your awareness to expand out from your belly to fill the entire capacity of your body.
Noticing how it is to feel your whole body and the space that it occupies.
Allow your breath to fill your whole body each time.
Coming back down to the breath in your belly,
Noticing the rise and fall of the belly again.
From the belly,
As you breathe a long slow breath out,
Your awareness goes down to the ground,
Sending roots of awareness down into the ground below you,
Curiously inquiring into the deep space below you and exploring the space.
With a deep breath in through the nose,
Bring your awareness up into the belly again,
Resting there for a bit as you breathe in and out.
Now a deep in-breath sends your awareness up through the center of your body,
From your belly to the crown of your head.
As you breathe in,
Your awareness goes up to the top of your head and as you breathe out,
It comes down again to your belly.
Now as you take a deep breath in,
As your awareness goes up to the top of your head,
It sends curious branches of awareness out into the space above you,
Exploring the infinite space above your head.
If you want to,
As you breathe in,
You can allow yourself to be drawn to the space above you,
Observing yourself from above,
Looking down on yourself and your life situation as it is right now,
Like a bird's eye perspective on your life as it is and seeing the bigger picture.
Notice what it's like for you to see your life from this wider perspective.
A long slow out-breath draws your awareness back down through the center of your body into the belly again,
Resting there again for a moment,
Breathing in and breathing out.
Now as you breathe in,
Let your awareness be drawn out to the left-hand side of you,
Like a tree letting curious branches of awareness extend out into the space on your left,
Noticing whatever you notice,
Just letting it be as it is.
There might be a certain quality to the space on your left.
Let yourself explore with curiosity and open-heartedness.
Let a long slow out-breath draw your awareness back in towards your belly again,
Resting back in the belly for a few moments.
Now in the same way with a deep breath in,
Let your awareness expand out to the right-hand side of you,
Curious branches of awareness extending out to the right,
Letting them explore the fullness of that space and noticing whatever is there for you.
With a long slow breath out,
Your awareness gradually draws back into the belly again.
You could for a moment contrast the left and the right.
How do these two sides differ from each other?
Is one side heavier,
Lighter,
More spacious?
Different colors or images arising?
It could be like a scale,
Noticing how one side might differ from the other,
Or not.
Now with a deep in-breath,
Your awareness draws out to the space behind you,
Curious branches of awareness extending out behind you,
Fully exploring the space behind your body.
Let it explore as far out as it wants to go,
Noticing anything that's there for you right now.
With a long slow out-breath again,
Your awareness draws back in towards your body,
Into your belly,
Resting there for a few moments.
A deep in-breath allows curious branches of awareness to extend out into the space in front of you,
Letting them explore the fullness of the space in front.
You could maybe notice something different there,
Or a different quality to the space than you normally notice.
A long slow breath out draws your awareness back into your center and back into your belly again.
And now as you breathe in,
Let your awareness expand out in all directions,
Into the entire space that your body occupies.
Breathing in again,
Your awareness gradually expands further out in all six directions,
Into the infinite space around you that the branches explore.
Below you,
Above,
To the left,
To the right,
Behind you,
And in front.
Noticing the fullness of that space,
The energetic feeling of it,
The spaciousness of it,
Let your presence really fill that space.
Notice how it is to experience yourself as this expanded awareness.
As you breathe a long slow breath out,
That awareness draws back into your body,
Feeling the fullness and the vitality of the entire space of your body.
Notice how it feels to be in your body right now.
What's alive there for you?
What's present or arising?
And rest in that space of awareness for a while,
Letting whatever you notice be there as it is.
Before you open your eyes,
You can have a deep and nourishing stretch,
Whatever feels satisfying for you.
Noticing how it feels in your body as you do that.
When you're ready,
You can gently open your eyes,
Coming back into the room around you.
Noticing how you feel in the present moment.
I hope that you enjoyed this expansiveness meditation and that it brought you some calm and maybe a different perspective on your life right now.
Life is challenging,
But often it's not directly our situation that causes a struggle,
It's how we respond to it.
Having an expanded sense of awareness can really help to shift and open this perspective.
Thank you.
