Welcome friends.
I'd like to share with you some information and then a meditation to calm the nervous system using the five senses.
There are many ways to work with stress in our life.
Listening to music,
Making art,
Exercising.
Mindfulness meditation is a practice that can be done anywhere,
Anytime.
In as little as 10 minutes a day,
Meditation can soothe the effects of anxiety on the body and mind over time and provide a go-to for times of stress.
Meditation is a centuries-old practice that has been proven to soothe stress and anxiety by bringing our moment-to-moment attention to what is actually happening in the present moment.
And in doing so,
We move reactions from the limbic part of the brain to the frontal cortex where logic and reason can take place.
The following practice can be very helpful during periods of anxiety or stress by helping to ground us when our mind is recycling uncomfortable thoughts.
Before starting this exercise,
We pay attention to our breathing for a few breaths.
Slow,
Deep,
Long breaths can prepare us for a structured meditation practice.
Once you are comfortable following your breath,
We will go through steps that ground the mind and body by moving our attention through the senses.
Let's begin by finding a comfortable position,
Sitting on a cushion or a chair or on the ground.
Notice where you are sitting.
What are the areas that are in contact with your seat,
Your legs,
Your feet,
Your back?
Next,
Notice your head and your shoulders and also your back.
And I invite us to to be relaxed and yet alert with our head reaching the sky,
Our shoulders relaxed towards our waist and the lower part of our body.
Noticing the temperature of the air on your skin around your face and neck,
Or maybe you even have your arms exposed to the ambient air.
Connect to your environment this way.
Beginning with the breath to anchor our attention for this practice.
Let's go through the different parts of our body where we can feel the breath,
Beginning with the nostril and upper lip.
Inhaling through the nose and exhaling through the nose or if you prefer for through the mouth.
Observing the temperature of the air,
The difference between the air that is coming in in and coming out.
Usually the air coming in is cooler than that which is coming out.
Notice the sensation of the exhale on the upper lip.
That very gentle caressing of the air as it comes out.
Let's move our attention to the chest area,
Breathing in through the nose and out through breathing in through the nose and out through the nose.
And at the same time,
Noticing how the chest expands as the lungs fill with air and on the exhale how the shoulders relax and let go.
The expansion of the chest on the inhale and the relaxing and the resting that happens on the exhale and letting go.
Moving down to the belly area.
Let's notice what happens when we inhale.
The belly is like a balloon and it fills with air and then on the exhale again there's a gentle settling into our sitting posture as the balloon lets go of the air it has contained.
And now for about three breaths on your own,
Choose which of these body anchors you'd like to use to notice the personality of your breath,
The rhythm of your breath.
Maybe even paying a little extra attention to the breath on the exhale as it encourages the body to relax and ground into the sitting area and by extension into the ground through the legs and the feet.
Now that we are in tune with the breath and a little bit more relaxed,
Let's invite the five senses to help us relax further.
Let's notice five things we see around us.
So with our eyes open,
Just glance around your space and acknowledge five things,
Five objects,
Whatever those are.
Notice color,
Texture,
Overall shape,
How light touches and reflects off of that object.
And now I invite you to pick one of those and really get to know it.
Really observe and notice is it shiny?
Is it dark?
Is it smooth?
Is it rough?
What is the color most prominent in that object?
Allow the mind to do what it does best,
Which is assigning meaning,
Possibly a memory,
Or just identifying a scene.
Just acknowledge that the mind can be part of this meditation and allow it to be.
Let's acknowledge now the sense of touch,
And we're going to notice and observe four things that we can touch.
Where are your hands right now?
And what do you feel with your fingers?
Flesh,
Material,
It can also be the sensation of your feet in touch with the ground or your socks.
Let you observe four things on your own using the sense of touch.
And then again,
Using the sense of touch.
And then again,
Choosing one in particular,
And really bring full awareness to the sensation of touch.
Labeling it soft,
Scratchy,
Or smooth,
Or whatever word comes to mind that best describes that sensation.
Our third sense is the sense of hearing.
Between sight and hearing,
Those are senses that we use quite a bit.
So let's notice three sounds around us.
They can be external sounds or they can be internal sounds.
And I invite us to see if we can extend that awareness to sounds outside of the room that we are in,
Just stretching our ability to hear even further out than our immediate environment.
And notice the quiet in between.
So now let's notice two things we can smell in our immediate surrounding.
It could be internal as well.
The sense of smell can be rather subtle.
So let's say we're in a room and we're in a quiet room.
The sense of smell can be rather subtle.
So let's allow ourselves time to fully appreciate and recognize them.
The sense of taste is also quite subtle.
And it is associated or it collaborates with the sense of smell.
So we're going to attempt to notice one thing we taste.
You may,
Of course,
Pause this and continue on reviewing the five senses.
These have a particularly grounding benefit and can be done on the fly or as a prolonged practice.
And when you're ready,
And you feel that your practice has come to a close,
We can close our eyes for a bit and just notice the breath coming in and out of the body.
Doing a personal body scan,
Just an awareness of the whole body,
Then acknowledge the time that you have taken to do this practice.
And I invite you to come back to this or other practices in times of anxiety or stress.
Thank you so much for your practice and I wish you a lovely rest of your day.
