Let's breathe.
My name is Kathy,
And this is a short breath check-in.
And I'd like to tell you a little bit about why it's so important to take this time for yourself a couple,
Three times a day.
We live,
As you know,
In a very lightning fast,
Hustle and grind kind of multitasking world.
And if we're not aware aware of really checking in and taking care of ourselves,
Our breath can begin to mirror that fast paced way of living.
This can show up in simple ways like irritability,
Anxiousness,
It can affect our sleep,
Our digestive issues can mirror this kind of intensity and all sorts of things can reverberate in the physical body.
But the beauty of just learning how to check in with your breath,
It allows you to kind of catch yourself,
You become more aware of your own responses.
And you can begin to soften that nervous system on the regular during the day.
And this can help you with clearer communication,
Greater discernment,
And an overall more balanced physical,
Emotional and mental state.
So let's find a comfortable seat here.
If you're seated in a chair,
Feel that your feet are connected to the floor.
If you can slip off your shoes and let your bare feet touch the floor,
That's best.
And if your feet don't reach the floor,
Maybe on a pillow.
And feel your sitting bones anchored to the chair as your spine grows tall,
Shoulders dropping down away from the ears.
Let your face soften.
Feel the tongue move away from the roof of the mouth.
As it also softens.
You can even feel tension release in the teeth and the gums.
Allow your hands for now to just rest palms down on each thigh.
Lower your gaze or if you feel comfortable close your eyes.
And let's come into a moment of presence.
We are observing the flow of the already occurring breath,
Resisting the urge to fix or change anything at all.
We're just going to notice the breath a bit here.
One way to help this is to use the hands.
So take a hand and place one hand on the navel and another hand on the sternum.
And just relax the arms and the shoulders again and continue to just observe the breath.
Noticing its ebb and its flow.
And ask yourself,
Where am I breathing?
Which hand has more movement?
The hand on the belly or the hand on the chest.
Simply noticing the rise and the fall.
The filling and the emptying of the breath.
Now we're going to invite the breath to be a bit more centered in the space around the navel.
So as you're ready on your next inhalation,
Feel yourself expanding around the navel in all directions.
As your belly expands outward,
You may feel your waistline expand.
Feel yourself breathing into that lower belly.
Hand that's resting on the navel and as you breathe out notice how the belly moves back toward the spine.
The chest is still here.
Invite another breath like this,
Simply noticing and feeling that as you breathe in,
The abdomen expands.
Feel the hand on the abdomen move.
And the one on the chest is still.
And at the end of this exhalation,
Just relax your hands on your lap And let's just tune in to notice the response of the natural breath now.
Receiving the breath in any way it wishes to come in and to flow out.
Where does the breath feel comfortable going?
What is the location of my breath?
And then let's come in to modify the breath again.
So let's return the hands,
One hand on the belly,
One hand on the chest.
And as you're ready on the breath in,
Feeling again that you're breathing into the space of the abdomen.
Sometimes we'll call this the center body because it's really just the breath that is expanding around the navel in all directions away from there.
So it'll move downward,
It'll move a bit upward,
Perhaps into the low ribs,
But the chest is still here.
As you breathe out,
Feel how the belly moves back inward towards the spine and invite one more breath like that.
Let this breath be slow,
And smooth.
And in the abdomen.
Let the exhalation also be slow and smooth.
And at the end of the exhalation,
Release the hands and allow yourself to rest and just notice tuning in,
Not influencing anything here,
Just noticing.
The location of the breath.
What is the speed of the breath?
Does it feel fast here?
Or does it feel slow?
Softening all the muscles of the face.
The shoulders.
The back.
Feeling the length in the spine still as this allows the natural flow of prana to be invited in on this flow of the breath.
Prana is our life force energy.
And we are inviting this natural vitality of life force to enter when we are breathing with more awareness.
And we're also signaling the parasympathetic nervous system.
To kick back in.
So nice work.
That was your check-in.
Clearer,
Calmer,
Balanced.
You got this.
