Noting The Breath

This is a five minute mindfulness meditation using noting of the breath to anchor and settle the mind. It is useful for a quick in the moment practice to settle and calm the mind and bring back your focus.

Transcript

I'm going to share with you a brief meditation on noting. Come into your seat. You can be on a chair or sitting cross-legged. We're going to calm down the body by using the breath. So feel your seat on the chair or on the ground. Feel your sit bones. And as if you could take a breath up through the spine, Starting at the base, Breathing up into the lower back, The mid back, The upper back, All the way to the top of the head, Pausing. And then as you release the breath back down, Your spine relaxing, Your shoulders, And your entire body, Every single muscle, As you release the breath from the base of your spine and into your chair. Feel your body relaxing into the seat, Into the ground, And all the places where your body touches the earth, Feeling settled. Bring your attention back to the base of your spine. And if you haven't already, Choose whether to open your eyes or close your eyes. We're going to breathe up through the base of the spine again to the top of the head. And then as you breathe out, Slowly tilt the chin just slightly so you can get a nice straight spine. Bring the shoulders up and back and down. Again, Relaxing as you release the breath and the body into the seat, Feeling yourself relaxing and releasing any tension. We'll take one more breath like that, Starting at the base of the spine, Up through the lower back, The mid back, The upper back, To the top of the head, This time noticing if there are any thoughts. And as you breathe out, Try and release them just like balloons floating in the sky, Feeling your breath come down and watching the balloons of thought float away, Feeling settled in your seat, Grounded, Relaxed, And open. We're going to start to bring our attention to our breath. And as we do feel the breath coming in through your nose, Cool, And out through your nose, Feel the warmth. And to settle the mind a little bit and make this slightly easier, We're going to do a practice called noting. So all noting is is adding a word to your breath. So as you breathe in, You say in, And as you breathe out, You say to yourself out. Continue with this in, Out, In, Out, In, Out, In, Out, In, Out. And waking up and noticing, Coming back to now, Smiling and appreciating your practice for today.