To start today,
I encourage you to be mindful of where you might be sitting or laying down and maybe even standing up,
Making sure that you have space to move a little bit,
To stretch your limbs out,
And you can gently start to focus on your breath,
Noticing with curiosity if your breathing seems a bit shallow,
If it seems a bit heavy,
If your breathing feels relaxed,
Or if it feels difficult to take a nice deep breath.
Whatever you're noticing,
Just observing it and being curious.
I invite you to reach your arms out in front of you and then stretch them up above your body,
Above your head,
Taking a nice deep inhale and exhale and letting yourself shift around in whatever way feels comfortable to get a nice overhead stretch and then continuing some nice deep breaths.
You can move your hands,
Your arms,
On either side of your body to be stretching both arms out on either side of you and then letting your arms rest naturally down by your sides.
You can begin to roll your shoulders up,
Back,
And down with your breath,
Inhaling as your shoulders go up,
Holding there for a moment,
And then exhaling as your shoulders go back and down.
I invite you to roll your shoulders with your breath one way for a few breaths and then whenever you're ready you can reverse and roll your shoulders the other way,
Again syncing up this movement with your breath.
When you're done with those shoulder rolls,
You can lengthen your spine,
Really bringing awareness and noticing this part of our body that we don't always bring attention to,
Really lengthening that from the very top of the spine to the base of the spine and letting your shoulders and your arms and your torso shake a little bit,
Shaking out your arms,
Shaking out your shoulders.
Pausing,
I invite you to take three deep breaths with three audible sighs,
Filling your abdomen as much as you can and exhaling with a loud sigh as loud as you can.
Next,
I invite you to stretch your legs out and point your toes and then flex your feet back,
So your toes coming back towards your body and then pointing your toes again,
Doing this back and forth movement a few times,
Breathing and noticing what you feel in the muscles and ligaments in your legs and your ankles,
Different joints,
Really imagining breathing down into your toes,
Into the full span of your body and then letting your legs rest naturally.
The last thing I encourage you to do is stretch both your arms and your legs in whatever direction you would like,
Really thinking about how amazing it is that God created everything of our body,
Every last detail,
Every last nuance that we are breathing breath into,
He created and He knows.
I invite you to thank Him for what He has created and even invite Him to help us enjoy more delight in what He has created.
When it comes to our bodies,
We're often critical,
We often feel shame and so I invite you to just be curious and notice how that feels,
To imagine being grateful for the creation of your body.
If that feels odd,
If that feels uncomfortable,
That's totally okay,
You can just notice that,
Be curious about that.
If you'd like any more time to stretch and breathe,
You can pause this audio.
Whenever you're ready,
I'll close us with a prayer.
Lord God,
I thank you for your creation and I pray that you would give us moments today to delight in your goodness and delight in the goodness of your creation that even includes our embodied existence.
Would you breathe new life in us today?
Would you help us to stretch and wake up?
And as we step forward in this day,
Would we not view it as a day that we will walk alone?
But would you give us moments to see your presence with us and near us in new ways?
Amen.
