Practice: Continuous Body Scans

A Vipassanā-style guided meditation that will help you remain present, aware, and equanimous with what is. The more often you practice, the more this equanimity and Peace of Being will naturally become part of your day-to-day life.

Transcript

Welcome to this meditation, Continuous Body Scans. If in this moment your body and mind are agitated, Start by following your breath. Being aware of the inhale, Being aware of the exhale, For their entire duration, It doesn't matter if they are long or short, Just be aware. If on the other hand you are already feeling very peaceful, At ease, Then you can start moving your attention slowly, From the top of your head, Down, Through every part of the body, To the tips of your toes. Aim for the ball of attention to be a circle with a diameter of 5-10 cm, And aim to do each single body scan for 5-10 minutes. Make sure to not miss any part of the body. At first you may be experiencing the gross, The heavy sensations, And that's okay. When you encounter such a sensation, Place your awareness on it, Move within it, Around it, And keep going. As you will soon experientially find out, Sensations keep appearing and disappearing. They are temporary and changing all the time. Keep moving your attention in this way, With awareness and equanimity. If you are experiencing an unpleasant sensation, Do not resist it, Be with it. It is always moving, Always changing. If you are experiencing a pleasant sensation, Don't get attached to it, Don't start clinging and wanting it to stay. It will inevitably go too. Just keep moving your attention slowly through every part of the body. Just observe, Nothing to do, Nothing to change. If you feel like you are somehow forcing your attention to find sensations, Try instead to just move your attention to a certain spot on the body and let the sensations appear within this spot of attention. At first you may have the tendency to label sensations as pleasant, Unpleasant, Heavy, Big, Small, Light, Vibration. When you feel ready to do so, Drop these labels and just be with the sensation beyond conceptualization, Without thought. Remember, Do not get elated by the pleasant sensations that you encounter and do not get depleted or depressed by the gross or heavy sensations. Just keep noticing with awareness and equanimity. Remember once again that you are the awareness, The presence, Observing ever-changing sensations appearing throughout the body. First, Notice that this presence itself is always here, Always now, Changeless, Ever-present, Unaffected by any of these changing sensations. And second, Notice that the sensations are appearing effortlessly. In fact, You are not doing or creating neither the sensations nor the attention that is moving. This practice is a deep surrender to the flow of life and it also helps you to establish yourself as awareness, Allowing all things to be as they are, Without resistance for the negative experiences and without clinging or holding on to the positive ones. Notice that all you have ever really experienced has been in the realm of the body. It is in the body that you experience resistance. If there is something around you or outside of the body that you resist or that you like, You experience it within the body. So by working on sensations and equanimity with sensations, We are working on equanimity with every experience that you've had in the past and that you will have in the future. But do not think too much about this, Do not try to intellectualize the process and the practice. It is about experientially understanding directly, Here and now, The importance of remaining equanimous. The more you notice that sensations are everything and that they keep changing, The less you will be attached to the good ones and resistant towards the heavier, More difficult ones. All sensations are changing, Changing, Changing all the time. The more you do this practice, The more you will be able to let go even of moving the attention. You will let it happen, Let it move as it wants, But do not force this. For now, Do whatever feels right, Natural and effortless for you. Just move your attention from head to feet, From feet to head, Noticing sensations without attachment, Without resistance, With equanimity and awareness. As you do this practice, You will also become less attached to your personality, To your sense of self, Which is in fact the belief in separation. Because the body that so far has felt so stable, So constant, So similar day to day, You are now experiencing as changing all the time. Ask yourself, Genuinely, Is the body-mind that started this meditation the same as the body-mind that now is about to end it? And now you know that the same is true for everyone. So you can let go of expectations from yourself, From your own body-mind and from other people, And let them be exactly as they are moment by moment. Thank you for listening and for practicing. To go deeper into this practice and these teachings, I recommend creating a 10-day retreat for yourself by listening to my meditation called Following the Breath for 3 days in a row, Followed by this one for 7 days in a row. The first meditation will help you deepen the practice by tuning into the subtle sensations which you will then be able to feel all over the body. I also recommend keeping this practice of following sensations as much as possible throughout your day to day life. If you are walking, Be aware of the sensations on your feet and in your body. If you are eating, Be aware of the sensations in your mouth and in your body. If you wake up in the middle of the night, Again do this practice until you fall asleep again. It is a very powerful practice which will help you to remain aware, To remain present and to remain equanimous and at peace with things exactly as they are. You will remain in touch with your true changeless self, Independent of experiences. As you continue to practice, You will become very aware of imbalances in your system. You will be very aware when you are clinging to a good or happy event or circumstance and you will also be very aware when you are resisting something or someone. You will also notice that the two are actually the same. When you cling to happy, Joyful experiences in the body-mind, Inevitably, Life will reflect that belief, That attachment to you at some point by giving you its opposite. So you will have to experience heavy, Tense feelings at some point which are the releasing of this attachment. But of course, If you resist those, Then the attachment remains. So that is why equanimity is of utmost importance in this practice. So keep practicing and you will inevitably see results almost straight away in your life. You will get less angry, Less sad, Less caught up in the mind, More allowing and accepting of yourself and others and your days will be underlied by a sense of peace, A silent joy. Thank you again. I wish you a happy day ahead.