Hello and welcome to The Daily Insight.
My name is Vidya Mala Burj and today's meditation is going to concentrate on cultivating deep embodied breath awareness.
If we're inside the body,
Aware of sensations in the body,
We can't be lost in thinking at exactly the same moment.
So coming inside the body deeply,
In particular being aware of the movements and sensations of breathing in the body,
It's a really good way to cut through habits of rumination,
Distraction and getting lost.
So to begin with,
Allowing the weight of the body to settle down onto the surface that you're sitting upon or lying upon.
You can do this practice either lying or sitting,
It's completely up to you.
But seeing if we can allow the body to come to rest,
To settle.
Feeling into the points of contact between the body and the bed,
The floor or the chair.
And seeing if we can allow our weight to rest down through those points of contact.
And dropping our awareness right down inside the abdomen,
Inside the belly.
What movements and sensations of breathing can you feel in your belly with each in-breath,
With each out-breath?
Seeing if you can allow the belly to swell on the in-breath to subside on the out-breath in its own natural rhythm.
And coming into the back of the body,
Allowing your awareness to move through the inside of the body and to feel any movements and sensations of breathing in the whole back of the body.
Perhaps feeling movements in the back of the ribs,
In the back of the lungs,
In the upper back.
Maybe the shoulder blades moving a little bit away from each other on the in-breath,
Subsiding on the out-breath.
And what can you feel in the lower back?
Can you allow breathing to express itself inside the lower back?
And broadening to be aware of the whole back of the body.
Broadening on the in-breath,
Subsiding on the out-breath.
And now coming through the body again to the chest,
The ribs expanding on the in-breath,
Subsiding on the out-breath.
The lungs filling and emptying.
The sternum rising and falling.
And now broadening to be aware of the whole torso,
The volume expanding on the in-breath,
Subsiding on the out-breath.
Now allowing our awareness to pour down into the arms and the legs,
The hands,
The feet,
The fingers,
The toes.
So we've got the big movements of breathing in the whole torso and it's like they're spilling out into the limbs.
So the limbs too are full of breathing.
Perhaps noticing the way the body is more dynamic,
More fluid than we normally realise.
Continual subtle movement with breathing.
Big movements in the middle of the body and very subtle echoes at the edges of the body.
And including the neck and the head,
The face.
Maybe some sensations of breathing at the nostrils.
Being aware of the whole body.
Sitting here,
Lying here,
Being breathed.
And as we begin to bring this meditation to a close,
Perhaps forming an intention to take this embodied,
Gentle,
Fluid breath awareness with us into the day.
So I hope you have a great day.
