Cultivate Self-Kindness In 10 Minutes

This guided meditation allows you not only to pause but to cultivate self-kindness and improve the relationship you have with yourself. We practice recharging ourselves with the quality of acceptance, warmth and kindness, which helps re-balance the impact of the very judgmental voice that lives in our head.

Transcript

Hi there, This is Sarah and thank you so much for joining this 10-minute guided meditation for self-kindness. So do whatever you need to do to create a comfortable space for yourself. Adjust the way you're sitting or lying down, Wiggle around, Do whatever you need to do so you can truly hit the pause button and give yourself this gift of the next 10 minutes where we allow ourselves to step out of the busyness of everyday life. We allow ourselves to put all the to-do lists aside and we simply begin by tuning into our body. So just notice your body being here, Your breath moving your body moment to moment, Every inhale and every new exhale. And right away let's choose an attitude of curiosity and kindness towards ourself, Our experience, Remembering that so often we are our own biggest critic, Our own harshest judge. And let's be honest, Life is tough enough. We do not need to make it even harder on ourselves and yet we do. And that's very human and it's okay to just acknowledge that inner critic self-judgment, Even the self-hatred that many of us feel. And having acknowledged that as we're sitting here or lying here, Let's also remember that the kindness we give to others is the same kindness we deserve ourselves. So you can imagine the same way you talk to a friend, A beloved person. You wish them well, You listen to them, You support them no matter what. With the same quality of kindness and grace and acceptance, Benevolence, Try to meet yourself with that quality. How would it feel like to give yourself that warmth, That love, That forgiveness? And as you imagine that, Notice how your body feels and how your physical sensations change. I can feel a warmth in my heart region. I can feel a little smile tugging on my lips. Tune into that. Recharge yourself with self-kindness. And just take another moment to bask in this wonderful feeling of self-kindness, Experimenting with how it would feel like to befriend ourselves. There's this saying that the relationship you have with yourself is the longest you will ever have. So make it a good one. And it always inspires me to truly come back to the practice of self-kindness, To keep on cultivating this meaningful relationship with myself, Trusting that all of my relationships will benefit from that too. And if you feel that, You can set a little intention to notice in the next days and weeks when your inner critic shows up and becomes very loud inside of your head. And then turn up the volume of the voice of self-kindness within yourself. And ask yourself, How would a really good friend meet me and treat me right now? And follow that. See what changes. With that, I invite you to take another deep breath in. Slow and long breath out. You can begin to slowly move your toes, Wiggle your toes, Move your hands. Bring some fresh energy into your system with the next deep inhale. And in your own time, You can open your eyes, Look around the room. Thank you so much for practicing with me. And I hope to share another meditation with you soon. Take good care.