My first invitation for you is to settle into whatever position allows your body to feel held,
Seated,
Lying down,
It doesn't matter,
What matters is that you're here.
When you've found that position that allows you to feel held,
I'll invite you to gently close your eyes if that feels right for you.
With the eyes closed,
As you start to softly arrive here,
I want to offer you a different frame for what we're about to explore together.
This is not a meditation about relaxation,
Though you may relax.
This is not a meditation about healing,
Though you may feel like something heals inside of you.
This is a meditation about devotion,
About tending to the sacred thing you live inside,
About approaching your own body the way you might approach an altar with reverence,
With slowness,
With hands that know they're touching something holy.
Before we go any further,
I'll invite you to just notice what's already starting to swirl inside you,
Noticing any places that feel tingling or fast-moving stories in the mind that feel like anxiety.
The realm of the body is so intimate and so personal,
So I'll invite you again to be gentle with yourself,
To be aware of your breath,
To notice how you're held right now as we start our practice,
As we begin our practice devoted to your body together.
Noticing the sound of your inhale,
And the sound of your exhale.
Feeling how your body receives the air around you,
And how your body releases what no longer serves it on the exhale.
And we'll start our practice by acknowledging that we've been given many stories about the body.
We've been told the body is a problem to be solved,
A project to be completed,
A thing that's always failing or falling short,
Or needs to be different than it is.
The world around us hands us creams and programs and plans,
And we've been taught that if we just try hard enough,
We'll be able to fix this thing we live inside.
And perhaps if you're like me,
You've spent time trying,
Time trying to fix your one and only body.
Even though we've been given so many stories about our one and only body,
I want to remind you of an older story,
One you may have forgotten.
It's the story that tells us that our body is not a problem,
But that our body is a place.
A threshold.
A site where the mystery of being alive unfolds.
Where our unique intelligence and gifts and wisdom reside.
Every spiritual tradition knows this.
They know that the body is where the sacred enters the world.
That bone and flesh is not separate from spirit.
That bone and flesh are how spirit takes form.
And if this is true,
If your body is not a broken thing,
But a holy thing.
If your body is not a broken thing,
But a holy being,
Then tending to it is not vanity,
It's prayer.
I'll invite you now to tend to your body,
Bringing your attention to your feet first.
Not to fix them,
Not to assess them,
Just to acknowledge them.
Taking a moment to acknowledge that these feet have carried you through everything.
These feet have carried you through everything and everywhere you've gone.
They've walked you through great days and bad days and days you weren't so sure.
Through kitchens and grief and morning light.
They've always been there for you to stand upon.
When you offer them a moment of recognition,
A silent thank you for their service.
And when you're ready,
I'll invite you to let your attention rise slowly through your legs.
The places that have stood and walked and ran and given out and stood again and again.
You're not scanning for tension.
You're not looking for what's wrong.
You're not judging size.
You're simply visiting.
You're simply acknowledging.
You're simply being with the brilliance of this part of your body.
When you're ready,
Letting your attention arrive at your hips and your pelvis.
The seat of creation,
Of desire,
Of deep rest.
What would it mean to approach this part of your body with reverence,
To acknowledge all it has held and all it still holds.
When you're ready,
Moving your awareness now to your belly and lower back.
The soft animal center of you.
Pausing here for all this part of you has digested.
All the processing and metabolizing it has done.
Not only of the nutrients that nourish the cells of your body,
All the life experiences that you've had.
All the wisdom that lives in what you call your intuition.
All the wisdom that has formed what you call your gut instinct now.
Taking a moment to be in awe and wonder of all the wisdom within your belly.
When you're ready,
Rising up to your ribs and your chest and the chambers of your heart and your lung.
How they beat and breathe for you.
Faithful even when you forget to notice.
Taking a moment here to feel into the protective casing of your ribs and how they keep your heart safe.
When you're ready,
Moving the awareness now through your shoulders and your arms.
Your hands that have touched and made and offered and held so much.
How they've always been there to reach and to grasp and to hold.
Taking time to feel the strength and tenderness of your very own arms.
Taking a moment to be in awe.
Allowing your awareness to filter into your very own hands.
Acknowledging how much they've held,
But also how much they've let go.
When you're ready,
Moving the awareness to the space of your very own neck.
All the words that have been spoken.
All the silence that has been held.
Moving your awareness to your throat that has swallowed so many words.
Feeling the weight of the secrets that maybe still live there.
Allowing your awareness to be in awe,
This part of the body that bridges between mind and heart.
When you're ready,
Moving your awareness now to your face that has met the world each day with whatever it had to offer.
Allowing your awareness to filter through your skull,
This vessel of every thought and every dream and every memory you've ever had.
Taking your time to be here with these parts of your body.
Allowing yourself to recognize them as holy and sacred.
Allowing that awareness to spread through the rest of your body.
That the entirety of your body is a sacred space.
Every part of your body is worthy of your devotion and your attention.
One way we can honor the body is by bringing our attention to it.
So I'll invite you now to choose one part of your body,
Any part that maybe you have felt is asking for your undivided attention.
Maybe that's a part that hurts.
Maybe it's the part you avoid.
Maybe it's simply the part that arose as I spoke.
Taking your time to turn your attention to that one part of your body that's asking for more of your presence.
And when you're ready,
I'll invite you to place your hand on that part of your body to simply direct your full awareness there.
And with your awareness there,
Simply and silently asking inside yourself,
What do you need from me?
You may not receive an answer in words.
You may receive sensation,
A softening,
A memory,
An emotion.
Whatever comes,
Receive it.
This is the body speaking its own language.
You don't need to try and translate it.
Translate it yet.
When you're ready and when it feels right,
I'll invite you to offer a word of acknowledgement or a moment of breath to this part of your body.
This is the practice to ask,
To listen,
To offer,
Not once,
But daily.
The way a fire is tended to,
The way a garden is watered,
The way anything sacred is kept alive.
To ask,
To listen,
To offer.
Your body does not need to be healed or perfect or fixed to be holy.
It does not need to be pain-free or beautiful or young or able.
It does not need to be anything other than what it is right now.
In this breath,
In this shape,
It is taken.
It does not need to be perfect to be sacred.
It simply needs to be tended.
And the tending,
Turning toward the quiet reverence of attention,
Is the practice.
So may you treat your body as something worth returning to.
May you bring your hands to yourself with gentleness.
May you ask what is needed and listen for the answer.
And may you know in your bones that you are not a problem to be solved.
You are a place where something holy lives.
When you're ready,
Let your eyes open slowly.
Let the room come back in.
And carry this,
Not as something to achieve,
But as somewhere to begin.
