Mindfulness Meditation For Beginners | 6-Minute Meditation

Mindfulness meditation is the practice of bringing awareness to our experience without judging what we notice. It’s a common misconception that the mind “shouldn’t” wander while we’re meditating. This can be frustrating for many people, especially beginners, because it is the nature of the mind to have thoughts. Instead, the practice is to bring awareness to what’s going on inside us. In this meditation we’ll explore the first step of awareness: noticing when you’re not aware. Distraction is part of the process, and the practice of noticing when we’re distracted helps us strengthen our ability to be present.

Transcript

My name is Samantha Case and I will be guiding you through this guided meditation.

You will know this meditation is finished when you hear a gentle bell at the end.

If you'd like to receive more guided meditations visit SamanthaCase.

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To begin this meditation just find a position that feels comfortable for you.

So you may be seated,

You may be lying down,

But in whatever position you take see if you can bring a sense of alertness and erectness into the body.

Nice long spine.

Maybe you rest your hands in your lap or if you're lying down you can let them relax along your sides.

If it feels comfortable for you,

You can let your eyes close or you can let them come to rest on a point out in front of you so that your gaze softens.

Together we'll take a couple deep breaths.

So starting by letting out all of your air and then take a deep inhale through your nose filling your belly and your chest and a slow exhale slowly releasing and again a deep inhale bringing the awareness into the body and a slow exhale relaxing letting go and one more time a deep inhale and a slow exhale.

Now let your breath return to its natural rhythm and take a moment just to notice how you're feeling,

How the body feels,

What the state of your mind is.

Maybe it feels really busy in there or maybe it feels more calm.

You're just taking note of what the weather is looking like,

The internal weather of course.

If it's windy,

Calm,

Sunny,

Gray and see if you can notice this without having a sense of judgment or needing it to be any different at this moment.

Now bring your attention to your breath and notice where you feel the breath most easily.

So this might be in the rise and fall of your stomach or your chest or it could be in your throat or in your nostrils.

Wherever you most easily feel it,

See if you can let your attention rest here.

Noticing each inhale and noticing each exhale and you might notice that in doing this practice the mind will quickly grab your attention.

This I'm happy to tell you is totally normal.

This is what the mind does and when this happens see if you can bring your awareness back to your breath.

It's in noticing when we're distracted that we begin to strengthen the muscle of mindfulness.

We notice when the mind is wandered and then we gently bring our attention back to the breath to this moment.

With each inhale you might imagine yourself gathering your awareness and each exhale you might imagine yourself relaxing deeper into your seat.

And now take a moment to notice how you might feel different after this short pause,

This short meditation.

Maybe you don't feel any difference and that's okay too.

And when you feel ready you can gently blink your eyes open.

Maybe take deep stretch as if you're just waking up and see if you can continue to move throughout your day with this sense of noticing when you're distracted and coming back to the moment.