Welcome to the Mindfulness Without Bells and Beads meditation series.
Awareness of Breath Meditation The most basic way to do a mindfulness meditation is simply to focus your attention on your breath,
The inhale and exhale.
And anytime your mind wanders away,
Just notice what your mind got caught in,
Release it,
And bring your attention back to noticing the sensations of breathing.
Be gentle with yourself,
As you're probably new to this.
The most important thing is to bring a sense of curiosity and patience to the experience.
Let's begin.
Find a comfortable place where you can sit for a few minutes.
You don't have to sit in a lotus position on a meditation cushion.
Sitting on a chair will work equally well.
Sit up straight but relaxed,
And allow your feet to be flat on the floor.
The rationale for sitting up straight is to remain awake and alert for the exercise.
You can place your hands anywhere that feels most comfortable.
You don't have to hold your hands in any special way.
Allowing the eyes to close if that feels comfortable.
Otherwise lowering the gaze down at about a 45 degree angle,
And softening your focus.
The whole point behind closing the eyes for this particular exercise is to just eliminate visual distractions.
Bring your attention now to noticing the sensations of the breath wherever you feel them most distinctly.
You might feel the sensations of air moving in and out of your nose as you breathe in and breathe out.
You also might notice sensations associated with the rising and falling of your chest or your abdomen each time you breathe in and breathe out.
Sensations of breathing in any of those areas are perfectly fine to focus on for this exercise.
If you have some difficulty noticing the sensations of breathing,
You can go ahead and take one or two deeper breaths intentionally just to get a sense of what these sensations feel like and where you might focus your attention.
Then release any impulse to control or change your breathing.
Remember this is not a breathing exercise.
It's not yogic breathing or box breathing.
This is an exercise in attention and awareness.
Just noticing the sensations of breathing as the breath breathed itself.
Paying close attention to the sensations for the full duration of each in-breath and the full duration of each out-breath.
You might find after a short time that the mind has wandered away from the breath to a thought or judgment,
Perhaps a judgment about the exercise or a thought about what you have to do later today.
When this happens,
It's not a mistake.
You've not done anything wrong.
Just notice what the mind got caught up in and gently but firmly escort your attention back to noticing the sensations of breathing.
The mind will get caught up in thinking over and over again.
Whether this happens 50,
500,
Or 5,
000 times,
Just acknowledging where the mind went and guide attention back to the breath each and every time.
No need to harshly criticize yourself for getting lost in thought.
This is the practice.
I invite you to open your eyes if you've closed them and bring your attention back into the room you're in,
Giving yourself a moment to get your bearings before moving on to the next part of your day.
Thank you.
