Connection Meditation

When we're anxious, low, or in pain we can feel isolated from others. This Breathworks meditation helps us to focus on connection rather than separation.

Transcript

So I'm going to lead this practice and it's predicated on an understanding that when we suffer pain or anxiety or low mood,

They can all get very narrow and isolated and we can feel cut off and separated from others.

So this helps us to focus on a sense of connection instead of isolation.

Making full and generous contact with this posture,

Upright.

Supportive.

Stable.

Supporting our intention to be awake.

Inviting awareness deep into the body.

Following the breath to the lowest point it seems to reach.

Following the breath all the way out.

So noticing any tension or holding.

And on the out-breath.

Allowing the earth to hold your body because it will.

Paying a kindly attention to your experience.

Pleasure.

Pain.

Subtle and gross experience.

We don't have to push it away if it's difficult or keep hold of it if it's pleasant.

Rather to let experience flow through us and to recline into this broad and open field of awareness.

Where all of you is welcome.

The sense of the nature of experience.

How it arises.

And passes away.

Pain and a confidence in this knowing.

So into this broad and generous awareness.

Let's invite a friend.

So this person can represent all the people in your life that you like.

Sometimes it's easy to complicate this.

So choose someone who's alive,

Who you like,

Who you have a relatively uncomplicated relationship with.

And sometimes we want to fit in every single person who's ever been our friend.

And it all gets a little bit crowded so let's just choose one person.

You can fit everyone else in another time.

Choose one person and bring them to mind or to heart in a way that works for you.

Or maybe you see them.

Or maybe you feel them or maybe you hear them.

Maybe you can see yourself sitting on the couch with your feet up talking to them on the phone.

Maybe they wing you up and say how you doing.

You feel that you can be yourself with them.

And that they care for you.

Maybe you can have a laugh with them.

Maybe they're kind and they come and take you for a cup of tea and things are not going so well.

Perhaps you can see them,

Their face,

Their hands,

The way they walk.

Just getting a sense of what it feels like to be connected with this human being.

Maybe it makes you smile or you feel safe.

Or you feel gratitude,

Love.

And maybe you know that this friend suffers.

Maybe they get anxious.

Things are difficult at work.

Kids are difficult,

Complicated.

Perhaps they're in pain.

They're lonely.

Short of money.

They struggle.

Just like we do.

And they don't want to suffer like this.

They want to be happy.

And maybe we respond to their suffering.

Just notice where you feel that.

And sometimes they are happy aren't they?

They've got money,

They're loved.

The kids have sorted themselves out.

Things are easy,

They're happy.

Perhaps it's good to see this.

And sometimes we're happy aren't we?

There may be superficial differences between us.

But basically we suffer.

We push away what we don't like and we cling to what we do like.

We want to be happy and we don't want to suffer.

Everything that we wish for ourselves we can wish for them.

On the in-breath,

Breathing this human being in their whole life.

And on the out-breath wishing them well.

And we can tailor make this so as it's relevant.

You know if they're anxious and scared we can wish them to be safe.

If they're troubled we could wish them peacefulness.

Breathing them in and on the out-breath wishing them well in a way that's relevant to them.

And if you've wandered off it's okay.

Just coming back to the practice of wishing your friend well.

So let's broaden out a little bit.

Let's add a couple more people.

People on the retreat for example.

We know that they struggle and they suffer.

We know that.

We've heard it.

They worry and they're in pain.

And things sometimes just are difficult.

Sometimes they've got a lot to bear.

Sometimes they look rested and peaceful.

Sometimes things will be easier for them.

They don't want to suffer either.

Just like us.

They struggle with aversion and clinging as well.

Maybe you can see them.

You've got a sense of them as you've moved around the retreat centre.

Or about the blackbirds and the two little more hens that scurry between the trees and the pond in the morning when we're eating breakfast.

They want to be safe as well.

They want to live.

I'm afraid so.

Look at us all.

We just want to be happy.

Just kind of sense of this practice in the body.

If it's all in the head,

Come back to the body on the in-breath.

Come back to the heart.

Wishing these people well.

From the center of your body.

Breathing them in.

In-breath,

Wishing them well.

And let's not stop there.

Let's keep going.

Wishing about them people you see slumped in the doorways when you're doing your Christmas shopping.

Got a bit of cardboard and a sleeping bag about them.

About all the people in hospital.

Or prisons.

What about the little beings that are just being born?

All those people on the motorway.

All the stray dogs and the pigeons.

The hearts vast.

We can get them all in.

And they all suffer and they all want to be happy.

Just like us.

Letting this Letting this sense of me as separate and different soften.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

People we like.

People we don't like.

People we judge.

People we think are better than.

People we think are better than us.

Wishing them all well.

As best we can.

Expanding awareness.

To encompass the whole world.

Because we know what it looks like don't we?

Spinning through space.

All the beings on it.

Not just humans.

All of us vulnerable.

We want to be loved and we want to be happy.

And we don't want to suffer.

We can breathe the whole lot in.

And on the out-breath wishing us all well.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Letting ourselves be touched by our commonality.

Reviews

I love this practice, makes me feel safe, in these troubled times.
thank you 🙏

I felt included. One with all the others. Thank you.

🙏 real, raw, profound practice. Thank you

Beautiful
Just what I needed
Thank you

Just what I needed...

What I needed. Thank you for popping up :)

I'm looking with those big full moon eyes now.
Excellent

Wow, powerful meditation, beautifully led.

Very supportive, thank you Colette.

Thank you, Colette.

Thank you it's just what I needed!! got a lot of positivity from this..
'Namasté'🕉☮

Lovely thank you

Good meditation to do on a regular basis to keep oneself connected, thank you.

I found this extraordinarily beautiful and moving. Thank you, dear.