Welcome!
This is the eighth of a series of meditations on being present now.
I am Italian and I live in Italy so I speak English as a second language.
If my accent and my lexical and grammatical letters do not interfere too much with your mindfulness practice,
I really hope that you can find here some hints or even insights on the art of being present.
If my accent is interfering too much with your comprehension,
Then I am sorry but my meditations are then not probably good for you.
This series goes from 15 minutes of the first one to the 30 minutes of the tenth and last one.
So,
The meditation that we are doing now is about 27 minutes long.
As usual,
We start by bringing our attention to the breathing,
Following the in-breath and the out-breath.
Breathing in,
I feel the movement of the chest or in the abdomen and breathing out,
I feel this movement in the abdomen or in the chest.
I might need to take a few deep,
Long breaths.
Be able to feel the breathing just the way it is right now.
Every time I breathe out,
I let go of all the ideas that I have about breathing,
About meditation,
About now,
About everything.
Breathing in,
I am just aware that I am breathing in and breathing out,
I am just aware I am breathing out.
I let the breathing be as natural as possible once I have settled in my meditation,
Once I have arrived in my body,
In my posture,
Comfortable ease posture,
So that I can simply follow this air going in and out of the nostrils and keep my mind on the feelings that are happening right now in my body.
At the nostrils,
Where the hair gets in and out,
In the chest,
Expanding and contracting during each breath,
Or at the abdomen,
Where the belly is itself expanding and contracting at every breath.
Inhaling,
Exhaling,
And while I am exhaling I let go of all the tensions in my body and in my mind.
If there is a pain right now,
I try not to react with my body,
Wanting maybe it to go away by changing abruptly my position,
And also with my mind I don't get in conflict trying to push it away somehow.
It doesn't work anyway,
So if there is a pain or a tension I just go gently with kindness,
Close to the tension,
Close to the pain,
With my awareness.
By going near the pain,
Near the tension,
I can know it,
Know the qualities.
How is it?
Is it warm,
Hot,
Cold?
Does it pull or itch or burn?
Is it a vibration,
A movement,
Or is it so strong that it feels like solid,
Still?
I try to take care of these sensations that arise even if they are unpleasant,
Because if they are here,
If they are inside of me,
I need to take care of them by going there with kindness,
With loving kindness.
And by breathing in and breathing out mindfully,
I allow these sensations to be just the way they are.
Breathing in,
I become aware of the sensations that are present in my body.
And breathing out,
I let go of all the ideas that I have about myself,
The situation,
The meditation,
Whatever.
Let go of all the thoughts,
All the interpretations,
All the meanings,
All the theories.
Just be,
Be with the sensations,
The warmth,
The coldness,
The pulsating,
The vibrating.
Breathing in,
I become aware of what is present inside myself right now.
And breathing out,
I let go of all the ideas,
All the words that are going around in my head,
All the thoughts.
I let them fly away.
When I keep my attention,
My wise attention on my breathing,
The rising and falling of the abdomen,
The air coming in and going out.
Breathing in,
I allow all the sensations in my body just to be the way they are.
Breathing out,
I let go of all the ideas,
All the concepts,
All the meanings.
Breathing in and breathing out.
Breathing out.
Breathing out.
And if I get lost into thinking,
Let's see,
What am I grasping here?
Am I attached to an idea,
A theory,
Or what am I longing?
Do I have a desire?
What about if I let it go,
If I just drop all the thinking and I gently,
Slowly go back to my breathing without judging,
Just simply following the breath and letting go,
Letting go of all the thinking.
And let's notice if I am in conflict with something inside myself.
Maybe I'm saying I don't want,
I don't want something.
I'm trying to push something away,
A thought,
A sensation.
Let's see what's going on in my mind right now.
Am I lost into fantasies,
Longing,
Imagination,
Desires?
Or am I trapped into a conflict here,
Trying to push away something that I don't want,
But it's here?
Let's see if I can just drop all the thinking and let go of all the thoughts,
All the ideas,
And simply stay with the sensations that are present.
Maybe some sensations that are here now are not very good.
I don't like them,
But if they're here,
It means that I need to know them because they're part of me.
Otherwise I'm not embracing myself and not accepting myself.
I'm not opening my heart to myself.
And so maybe I need to take a deeper breath or a few deeper breaths to make space,
To let all that is present right now be into the space of awareness.
And when my heart starts to melt a little bit,
I realize how silly it was to grasp an idea or to be in conflict with an idea.
I realize how much suffering I just create out of nothing.
While if I let go and I embrace what's present,
I slowly experience this widening of the space of awareness and this softening of my heart that allows me to embrace all that is present.
And so always stay in touch with my breathing and with my body,
My sensations in the body,
The hands,
The buttocks,
The head,
The legs,
The arms,
The back.
I can use those loving kindness words to help me connect with my heart.
And so while I'm breathing in I can say,
May I be well.
May I be well.
Breathing in,
May I be well.
And breathing out,
I let this well-being wish flow into the body,
Filling up every cell of my body,
Fill the tip of the toes,
The tip of the fingers,
And the top of the head.
Breathing in,
May I be well.
And breathing out,
Let this wish enter every cell of your body.
May I be well.
May I be happy.
Breathing in,
Well.
Breathing out,
Happy.
May I be well.
May I be happy.
Breathing in,
May I be well.
And breathing out,
I let this intention fill up my body and also go out of the body in all directions,
In the back,
Getting out from the front of the body,
The sides,
The upper part and the bottom part of my body,
Filling up the space around me,
The room,
The building,
Or the place where I am now.
Breathing in,
May I be well.
And breathing out,
I let this warm intention fill up my body and the place where I am now.
Breathing in,
May I be well.
Breathing in,
May I be well.
And breathing out,
Let this warm intention warm up your body in all directions,
The back,
The front,
The sides,
The head,
The feet,
And out of the body.
May all the people present in this place be happy now and be well.
Breathing in,
May I be well.
And breathing out,
Let this intention go through the body and outside,
Like flooding the space that surrounds you and touching all the people that are present in the area around where you are right now.
May all the people be well and happy.
Breathing in,
May we all be happy and well.
And always in touch with the breathing,
The rising and falling of the abdomen.
We are still,
Present,
Aware.
Let's stay still for a little longer to take note of the different perception of ourselves when we are still,
With our eyes closed,
In touch with our good intentions,
With the heart,
Compared to when we are moving a little bit and we open our eyes.
Let's feel the different perception of ourselves and the environment.
It is important to realize that we can function in different modes.
And one,
It's not better than the other.
They're just different.
But if we become aware of mindfulness,
Modality,
That will be more and more present in our everyday life.
And it will bring a different taste in everything we do.
When we eat,
When we talk with somebody,
When we listen to somebody,
Whatever we do,
The quality will be different.
So it's good to start to notice this different way of functioning of the mind.
We all know that there is a difference between being awake and being asleep.
The meditative state is something in between the awake and the sleepy state.
