Find a seated position where you can be fully awake and grounded.
Sense your feet or your sitting bones on the floor and sense your spine nice and tall.
As you ease into this position,
Welcome yourself exactly as you are,
Acknowledging whatever is here right now.
Maybe that's a sense of sadness,
A sense of frustration,
Or perhaps joy or hopefulness.
Noticing without judgment with an open heart and a few deep breaths.
Feeling yourself breathe all the way in,
Filling up,
And feeling yourself exhaling out,
Emptying all the way through.
As you breathe,
Remind yourself of your inner capacity for strength,
A steady heart amidst it all.
Take these next few moments to feel grounded right here.
Sense down through your body and feel the connection that goes into the earth.
Sensing from the crown of your head down to your neck and your shoulders.
Sensing through your midline down to your pelvis and hips.
Sensing into your legs and the connection of your sitting bones or your feet with the ground below you.
Invite gentle awareness to this moment just as it is.
And now sense any heaviness or tension that might be present.
This might be a physical sense or an emotional one.
As you inhale,
Feel your body fill up with your breath.
And as you exhale,
Follow the slow release out.
Following each inhale.
And with every exhale,
Feeling the tension drain down through your body,
Releasing it into the earth.
With each breath,
Sense a growing steadiness and sense of calm.
Now as you sit here,
Allow the image of a beautiful mountain to come into your view.
This might be a mountain you visited or seen in a picture or perhaps one that exists solely in your imagination.
Slowly let this mountain come into greater focus.
Sense the shape of the mountain and bring into view the mountain's peaks,
Its strong base rooted in the earth.
Notice how massive it is,
How solid,
How unmoving,
How beautiful.
Perhaps your mountain has snow covering the top or has trees growing along all sides.
There might be streams cascading down it or a still lake at the top.
Observe this mountain,
Noting what it looks like from every angle.
And when you feel ready,
See if you can bring a sense of this mountain into your own body sitting here.
As if your body and the mountain could become one.
Sharing in the magnificence,
The stillness,
And the strength.
Grounded here in this position,
Feel the strength of your body rooted into the earth and a sense of length through your spine.
With each breath in,
Sense your aliveness and with each breath out,
Connect to this centered,
Grounded,
Unmoving presence within yourself.
As you sit here,
Visualize the sun traveling across the sky,
The light and shadows changing with each moment.
Notice life all along the mountainside,
Streams,
Waterfalls,
Plants,
And wildlife.
The mountain remains steady as night follows day and day follows night.
The bright warming sun followed by a cool dark night sky.
Through it all,
The mountain remains still,
Remaining just as it is through the change of colors in each day and the change of colors in each season.
The summers bring strong sunlight and the winters bring freezing rain and snow.
Spring comes,
Flowers bloom,
And the birds sing in the trees once again.
Streams overflow with the waters of melting snow.
And yet through it all,
The mountain remains its essential self.
The mountain's magnificence and beauty remain unchanged.
In this same way as we practice mindfulness,
We can learn to experience life as this mountain,
Embodying the same central,
Unwavering stillness and groundedness in the face of everything that changes.
The shifts that happen over seconds,
Over minutes,
Over days,
And over years.
We will undoubtedly experience periods of light and darkness in our life,
Periods of joy and periods of pain,
Shifts in our body,
Mind,
And heart.
But the more we return to this practice,
The more we are able to tap into our inner reservoir of peace,
Of steadiness,
And of strength.
As we begin to close,
Sense back into your breath,
Taking some deeper inhales and exhales.
Tap into this sense of being fully alive while also staying deeply connected to the inner stillness within you,
Reminding yourself that this space,
This capacity is within you at all times,
Whenever you need it.
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