Gentle Lying Mindful Movement

This guided mindful movement intentionally is very gentle and spacious as the goal is to develop mindfulness with any physical benefits being secondary. Notice any impatience with the slowness and use this as an opportunity to be even more mindful.

Transcript

In this practice,

We're going to be exploring some movement.

This will help bring flexibility and ease,

Not just to your joints and muscles,

But also to your life.

These really gentle,

Paced movements can lead to more range of feeling that's not painful.

You need a little bit of patience,

But what a relief that's going to be.

So I know you will explore slowly and with some curiosity about the sensations,

Both the subtle ones and the intense ones.

And in doing this slow,

Curious exploration,

You'll be building more safe ranges of movement in your body.

This opening up the range of possibilities can be a surprising boost to your confidence as you make your way through the movement practice.

So finding your way to lying down now.

Knowing you have choice in any moment about what to explore.

I'll offer a bit of a range of movement and you can add a bit as you build more confidence that motion is lotion.

As you have more confidence that the sensations in your body is signaling hurt,

Not harm.

So feeling into the felt sense of lying here.

Maybe lying on a mat or a thick blanket,

Ideally on the floor.

Allowing your legs to be long,

Or you can have your knees bent,

Pointing towards the ceiling and your feet flat on the floor.

And really feeling the contact your body is making with the floor through the back of the head,

The shoulders,

Back of the chest,

Pelvis,

Buttocks,

Arms,

And legs and feet.

Remember,

We're going to be really slowing down,

Listening to our bodies.

Sensing,

Maybe even savoring sometimes,

Dropping into the felt sense of being alive in this moment.

As you perhaps feel a little more settled in,

Allowing yourself to make any spontaneous movements or stretches that would feel kind of satisfying right now.

Really feeling the sensations as you move.

Not needing to decide in your head what you're going to do,

But seeing if your body will tell you.

And then coming back into stillness,

Feeling the contact of your body again.

Maybe the contact of your clothing on your skin too,

And the air on your skin.

Warm or cool.

Resting.

Breathing.

No rush.

Allowing yourself to take a few fuller breaths now.

Deliberately allowing your abdomen to fill with air and rise in the in-breath.

And deliberately releasing go,

Letting go,

Letting the abdomen soften,

Yielding to the earth on the out-breath.

As you rest here,

Breathing,

Just feeling into the movements your belly is making.

Noticing as we pay attention to sensing the body,

Other stuff might be going on too.

Random thoughts or emotions,

Might hear sounds.

No need to struggle with these,

Just noticing them.

They can be part of the meditation.

And then coming back to the movement and sensing the body.

Easy does it.

No rush.

Just being present.

Joint movements.

So let's start with some other gentle movement.

And remember,

Your body knows.

So allowing your body to make any gentle,

Subtle or unsubtle changes to the movements.

If any of them are just not quite right for your body today.

So starting with rolling the head very gently from side to side.

Just little movements,

Noticing the pressure of the back of the head on the mat.

Sensations in the neck.

Maybe exploring making the movements slightly bigger.

Then a bit smaller again.

You might notice if this is feels pleasant or unpleasant,

Or neither.

And when you've moved symmetrically,

Just allowing the head to come to rest and notice,

Notice the sensations.

Moving the attention now to the hands.

Just allowing the hands to slowly and gently open and close.

Remembering that this is not exercise as such.

This is mindful movement.

Perhaps you might even say to yourself,

These sensations in the hands and fingers,

Might feel sensations right in the tips of your fingers.

Exploring all the sensations in the hands and fingers.

So you gently open and close the hands.

And then allowing them to come to stillness.

Noticing the effect of the movements of the hands.

And moving now to the feet.

You might like to pull your feet back,

Pointing the toes towards your face,

And then pointing the feet.

Gently moving back and forth between these two movements.

Noticing all the changing sensations in the feet and toes.

Maybe stretching up into your heels and legs.

Maybe you notice thoughts,

Even emotions.

It's all okay,

Just noticing.

And coming to rest,

Noticing sensations in the feet.

And now gently bringing your knees up,

Pulling them towards your chest with a hand on either knee.

Noticing how this feels.

Knowing that this is safe for virtually everybody.

Our bodies love this movement.

And then just checking out,

What would your body like here?

Perhaps you stay here and rock a little from side to side.

Perhaps you circle those knees,

Gently guiding them closer to your chest,

To the side,

A bit further away.

And then at some point,

Reversing that circle,

Making the movement symmetrical.

Really exploring the sensations.

In the sacral area,

Perhaps there's a pleasant massaging.

Perhaps there's some unpleasant sensations.

Maybe the effect on your breath.

And when you've evened this up,

Just coming to rest with your feet on the floor,

Knees pointing towards the ceiling.

Just noticing.

And now if it feels okay for your body,

You might like to gently,

Gently rock the pelvis backwards and forwards a little.

So tilting the tailbone towards the floor and exaggerating that arch in the back so it lifts off the floor a little.

And then flattening that back down,

Tilting the tailbone up.

You can do tiny movements.

You can do bigger movements.

It's even powerful to do this in your imagination.

It activates the same areas in the brain.

A beautiful,

Safe movement for almost all bodies.

So allowing that pelvis to gently rock backwards and forwards.

Really noticing the sensations.

And only if it's right today for your body,

Next time you tilt the tailbone up and flatten the back,

You might allow the buttocks and hips to actually come off the floor a little bit into what we call bridge pose.

And then curling the back and buttocks back down to the ground.

Doing this slowly,

Mindfully.

Really noticing the sensations.

And when you're ready,

Just coming to rest,

Just noticing the effect of the bridge pose.

And now you might like to either just rest the body and notice the sensations in rest.

Or it might feel right today to bring one knee towards the chest and extend the leg into the air,

Holding onto the leg behind the thigh and bringing that gently towards you.

The leg can still have plenty of bend in it.

And you might even like to extend that leg away and lower it to the earth.

So slowly being present for the moment when the leg touches the earth,

Feeling into the release,

The sensation of letting go.

And then putting that foot flat on the floor with the knee pointing to the ceiling and changing to the other leg.

Extending that after you bring the knee in towards the chest.

Holding onto the leg behind the thigh,

Bringing it gently towards you a little bit.

And then extending that leg away and lowering it to the earth slowly,

Really noticing that sensation of release.

And if it feels okay for you,

You might like to have a full stretch now.

Perhaps reaching your legs out flat on the ground,

Your arms overhead and stretching through the whole body,

Noticing any satisfaction,

Pleasantness in this.

Gently releasing those arms now.

Relaxing the legs and coming in to rest.

Now you might like to stretch those arms out sideways.

So you're in a kind of T position.

And then allow the hands to gently approach each other with the arms reasonably straight.

But then allowing those arms to cross over,

Crossing over the chest,

Elbows to the sky with the palms perhaps contacting the backs of the shoulders.

So noticing how this feels.

And then opening those arms out again into the T position.

Might even notice a preference for the opening or the closing.

And bringing those arms back,

Bringing the hands towards each other,

Allowing the arms to cross over,

Maybe the other way this time.

Allowing the hands to reach around the backs of the shoulders.

Perhaps making some subtle movements in this posture.

Just noticing the sensations.

And then allowing the arms to relax to the ground and taking a full rest.

And taking a minute to maybe listen to your body and do any final mindful stretch or movement of your choice.

And again,

Coming into a full rest.

Perhaps really sending yourself some appreciation for taking this time to attend to your body.

To safely open up your range of possibilities through the movement practice.

Reviews

I love this combination of gentle mindful movement and self compassion. I will add it to my playlist. Thank you.