Wheel Of Awareness Full Practice
Dan Siegel's Wheel of Awareness: The hub is the experience of awareness itself, while the rim contains all the points of anything we can become aware of. We can send a spoke out to the rim to focus our attention on points on the rim. In this meditation, there is an extra focus on our sense of interconnection with others as we link this rim point to the hub of awareness with our focus of attention. There is "me", "we' and when linked but still differentiated from what Dr. Siegel calls "mwe".
Transcript
So finding yourself a comfortable seated or lying position,
Having the back reasonably straight,
Just gradually noticing the breath.
Remember we're not trying to analyze the breath or imagine it or visualize it.
The idea is to really notice the felt sense of the breath.
And because we're human our minds will go lots of other places and just remembering this is a part of the meditation.
It doesn't have to be a barrier or an obstacle,
Just that beautiful noticing of thinking,
Leading the thoughts there.
No need to block them or struggle with them.
Allow them to just be and bringing the attention back to the breath.
Beautiful ebb and flow of the breath as an energy pattern.
Noticing the in breath,
Little pause,
The out breath and another little pause.
Now we're going to move that that spoke of attention from the hub of awareness of the wheel to the rim,
Starting with the five senses.
Starting off with noticing sounds,
Noticing that the energy pattern of sound without needing to go searching for sounds,
Without even needing to label them,
Just just receiving this energy pattern from outside the body into the ears,
The soundscape,
The textures,
The volumes,
The pictures.
Moving that spoke of attention now to the sense of sight.
So either with eyes closed or eyes gently open with a soft gaze,
Noticing,
Noticing the energy pattern of what we can see.
Maybe light and shadow,
Maybe colour and texture,
Maybe dimensionality.
Moving that spoke of attention to the sense of smell,
Another energy pattern outside the body brought in by the nose and the sense of taste noticed in the mouth and the tongue.
Now moving that spoke of attention to the sense of touch.
Again,
Technically outside our body energy patterns of the sense of touch on the skin.
Noticing where clothing,
Hair,
Jewellery,
Glasses,
Shoes,
Touching the skin,
The pressure of furniture,
The air temperature on the skin.
Maybe taking a deeper breath now,
Knowing we're moving the spoke of attention to the sense of interoception,
What we can feel within the skin,
Energy patterns within the body.
Perhaps starting with the top of the head and noticing sensations in the in the skull,
The eye sockets,
The cheekbones,
The jaws,
The jaw joints,
The back of the skull,
The facial muscles,
The scalp muscles.
Moving down to the neck,
Noticing muscles in the neck and the cervical spine traveling through the neck.
Noticing the shoulders from the inside out.
What can you feel in the joints,
The bones,
The muscles,
The ligaments?
Knowing that it's quite natural to visualise these parts but that's a thought so it's absolutely fine that that happens but just allowing that thought to to be there and really seeing if you can come back to the felt sense what you can actually feel within the shoulders.
The same as we stream the awareness down the arms,
The bones,
The joints,
The muscles and right down into the hands,
The tips of the fingers.
Now noticing what we can feel within the torso and pelvis,
Noticing what you can feel in the chest wall,
In the abdominal wall,
The rib cage,
The upper spine,
The lower spine,
The shoulder blades,
The back muscles,
The upper back muscles and the lower back muscles,
The pelvic bowl,
The sick bones at the bottom of the pelvic bowl,
The pelvic floor muscles,
The buttocks and streaming awareness right down the legs muscles and bones and joints,
Upper legs,
Knees,
Lower legs,
Feet right into the tips of the toes and then you're spending a little while noticing any energy patterns within the body.
Moving now to notice some of the organs within the body,
A little sufferer.
We can still notice energy patterns starting off with sensations in the genitals and then moving to the digestive system,
Noticing sensations in the rectum,
In the bowels,
Swishing through our abdomen,
Remembering this is where our gut feeling,
Our gut instincts come from,
All those many many nerves in there,
Almost like our gut has its own brain.
Focusing on our belly can give us so much information.
Following the digestive system up to the stomach at the top of the belly,
The esophagus as it travels through the chest and the throat and into the mouth,
Noticing the inside of the mouth and the tongue and moving to the respiratory system,
So noticing the breath in the nostrils,
Perhaps touching the walls of the nostrils.
You might be able to feel it in the sinuses behind the cheeks and traveling down the windpipe,
Down the throat,
Dividing in two to go to the lungs,
Noticing the sense of the lungs expanding and contracting.
Then moving to the sense of sensation in the heart area,
Perhaps the actual heart beating,
Perhaps more that sense of the heart in the center of the chest,
The heart space,
The source of our heartfelt feelings,
Perhaps you might have that beautiful sense of warmness or perhaps something quite different.
Can you be really kind to whatever you notice in the heart area?
You might even want to place a hand on your heart if that feels supportive.
And once again just expanding the awareness to notice any and all sensations within the body.
Taking a deeper breath now,
And moving that spoke of attention towards mental activities.
So we're noticing energy patterns that are primarily in the head brain.
This will be probably mainly thoughts.
This includes the mental component of emotions and urges and longings and dreams,
Attitudes,
Intentions.
Can you notice these energy patterns constantly rising and falling,
Ebbing and flowing?
Perhaps now seeing if you can become that student of the architecture of the mind,
That real noticing of how does a mental activity,
How does the energy actually arise?
Can you get a location?
Does it seem to be coming from somewhere?
How does it emerge?
Does that bubble up,
Flash up,
Unfold?
Is it a visual,
An audio,
Something a little different,
Something you can't quite articulate?
How does it hang around?
How does that thought stay?
What's its sort of texture?
And can you notice it slipping away?
How does it do that?
Taking a deeper breath now and before we move the spoke of attention to the fourth segment of the wheel,
Let's try something a little bit different.
There's no need to try hard or strive in this,
Just allow the words to wash over you.
See how it might be to imagine that spoke bending back on itself.
So the spoke of attention is actually now directed to within the hub,
Paying attention to the awareness itself.
Perhaps you might like to try instead of bending the spoke back,
You might try retracting the spoke,
So right in the hub,
Sitting,
Resting in the hub,
Resting in awareness itself.
Perhaps there's no need for a spoke at all and you can just be in the hub,
Maybe the hub gets much much bigger.
Notice that you're going into your head to think,
Again remember that's fine but thoughts are not particularly helpful in this part.
Maybe you could drop a question into your system,
Something like what is aware of all this?
Resting in pure awareness.
I'm taking a deeper breath now,
Moving to the fourth segment of the wheel,
The sense of interconnection,
Paying attention to energy patterns between us,
Without needing to strain or strive,
Just gently sensing if you can notice a sense of connection between you and me,
Between others on the zoom call.
Noticing if there's any sense of the energy patterns between you and anyone else in the house,
Including pets,
Maybe even including plants and seeing how it feels to start to cultivate the widening of that circle of interconnection.
As best you can,
Staying really kind to your own experience which will be different on different days,
Different moods and different people.
If you can notice energy patterns and flow between you and your loved ones,
For some this might be more noticing the breath connection or a visual thing,
For others who might be able to really feel that connection,
Something intangible.
Widening that connection now if it feels possible to people in your community groups,
Perhaps at work,
Perhaps at the shops and continuing to widen,
Perhaps noticing a sense of connection with all people living in Australia,
Perhaps even all people living in the world and there might be some individuals that it doesn't feel right to include,
There's no need to force this at all.
Just noticing if you can have a sense of connection to all people,
Perhaps gently exploring a sense of connection with all animals,
All living creatures on the planet,
All the plants,
All of us on this same planet truly interconnected,
Truly interdependent,
Spinning through space on the same planet,
Drinking the same water,
Breathing the same air,
Perhaps you might even feel some sort of sense of energy flow between you and the whole planet,
Perhaps not.
Whatever your experience is,
Just noticing it with that beautiful kindness.
Just trying out now these kind phrases that can be really helpful to some people to help this sense of interconnection,
Perhaps mentally repeating my words and just noticing how they resonate or not.
May all beings be well and happy.
May all beings thrive and flourish.
May all beings be calm and peaceful.
May I be well and happy.
May I thrive and flourish.
May I have a full meaningful connected life.
May I know calm and peace.
May Mowee,
M-W-E,
May Mowee be happy and well.
May Mowee flourish and thrive.
May Mowee know calm,
Peace,
Kindness,
Compassion and joy.
You may like to put your hands on your heart here again if that feels supportive.
Know that the meditation is coming to an end.
Just spending a moment noticing the effect of the meditation before gently moving the body and externalizing the awareness.
