Thank you for being here.
I invite you to settle into a very comfortable position and you can do this practice sitting down or lying down.
Whatever you feel guided to do right now,
Whichever position your body is telling you to take.
And in a few moments,
I'm going to ring the bells three times.
And as you tune into the sound of the bells,
I invite you to relax as fully as you can,
As much as you can.
And if it feels safe and comfortable to do so,
Why not close your eyes or simply lower your gaze?
And if you know you are likely to fall asleep,
Which happens so easily during meditation,
Making a kind of kind commitment to yourself to bring a gentle wakefulness to the practice today.
And if you do not love,
Fine.
But perhaps make that kind commitment to stay awake,
To stay alert as best you can.
Gently arriving here in this moment.
Perhaps noticing how easy or challenging this feels right now.
How much resistance shows up for you.
Even if you were quite looking forward to today's practice,
Just kind of gently observing how the mind is reacting to you taking some time out.
And I'm not saying this is the case,
But if it is the case,
Then telling your mind that you've got this for the next 25 minutes or so.
This is my time,
Dear mind.
I came here to sit.
I came here to practice.
And I'm safe.
And I'm very grateful indeed for your constant protection.
But I am keen to take this one by myself and practice my mindfulness meditation today.
And you,
Dear mind,
Can take a back seat for a few moments.
You can rest.
And we're going to start today's practice by taking a few deep breaths.
And I suggest we take three.
And so we will inhale through the nose and then hold for a few moments and exhale through the mouth.
So inhaling through the nose.
And hold.
And exhale through your mouth.
As deep into the belly as you can.
And inhale through the nose.
Hold.
And exhale through the mouth.
And one more time.
And then in your own time,
Letting the breath return to its natural rhythm.
Knowing that in the same way the mind takes good care of you,
So does your breath.
Keeping you safe and protected.
And now as best you can,
Bringing your awareness to the facial muscles.
And we're going to start with the forehead.
And the invitation is to relax the forehead as much as possible.
The eyebrows.
Softening the eyelids.
Your jaw.
Relaxing the tongue.
And the back of your head.
And your ears.
And bringing your attention down to the shoulders,
Allowing the shoulders to soften.
And the left arm.
And the right arm.
And the chest.
And as best you can,
Noticing any tension in the chest area.
And then relaxing the chest.
And moving your awareness down into the belly.
Noticing any tension there as well.
And gently inviting the abdomen to relax as best you can.
And then before we move down into the lower body,
Just checking in where your mind is at right now.
Has it tried to step in again and distract you from your practice?
Probably.
And if so,
Kindly bring your attention back to practice.
Now focusing on the left leg.
Allowing your attention to rest there.
The whole of the left leg.
And do the same for the right leg.
And as best you can,
Bringing your attention to both feet.
Sensing into the points of contact between the soles or the ankles of your feet and the bed or the floor.
Sensing into that raw sensation.
Feeling of skin on textile or your socks.
Also becoming aware of a sense of groundedness.
A sense of balance.
And as best you can,
Doing the same now for other points of contact between the body and the furniture.
But without striving too hard to feel anything in particular.
And now becoming aware of the whole body in this room,
In this space,
In this moment.
Your presence here.
And you in this moment,
Holding space for yourself.
And still with a sense of wakefulness.
And yet allowing yourself to relax as well.
Some of that pent up tension in the body,
In your energy field around you and in the mind.
Our practice today is similar to shaking a snow globe.
And then simply allowing all the snowflakes to settle until there is stillness and peace.
And we all need to loosen ourselves up,
Especially in order to sinking down from here.
Now cleverly asking ourselves to tell people to stay.
Being okay as best you can with stillness.
Noticing the potential discomfort around that.
Any restlessness of mind and body.
And the invitation in those moments is to be as gentle with yourself as possible.
Bringing kindness to your practice and self-compassion.
I'm a human being,
I'm not a robot.
There will be lots of stuff flying around my mind.
There will be a whole bunch of sensations and emotions streaming up and down my body.
And that is okay.
I'm proud of myself for being here.
I'm proud of myself for my commitment to my practice.
And returning to stillness.
Thank you.
And gently moving into the next part of our practice today,
Which will be an intentional focus on the breath.
Without changing the way we are breathing,
Simply identifying where in your body you can presently feel the breath the most.
And using that point as an anchor.
An anchor to return to whenever your mind wanders.
You may even want to place one hand on the chest and another hand on your belly.
That's just an invitation.
Just simply following your breath.
Breathing in,
I know I am breathing in.
Breathing out,
I know I am breathing out.
This is an in-breath.
And this is an out-breath.
And in a few moments I will ring the bells again three times.
To mark the end of today's practice.
You may want to wiggle your fingers and toes.
Or do a few stretches.
And that feels comfortable.
Go well,
Have a lovely week.
Namaste,
Bye for now.
