Hello everyone,
My name is Jamie Driver.
I am an instructor for the Contemplative Sciences Center at UVA.
I'm a trauma-informed yoga therapist and mindfulness instructor,
And today I'm going to lead you through a practice to embody and cultivate joy.
And I want you to begin by bringing to mind an experience from your past in which you felt an intense joy.
So maybe it was the day you got your first car,
The day you met your partner,
The day that you graduated from high school or undergrad or maybe got your PhD.
So just bringing that experience to mind now.
And while you're deciding on something,
Just want to talk a little bit about why we're going to do this practice.
It's really important that we set aside time throughout the day to spark joy,
As Marie Kondo says,
To embody joy and to cultivate joy simply because our lives in this day and age were constantly bombarded with messages telling us that we should be afraid or that we should be in fear and that we should be stressed out.
And what that looks like in the brain body is pretty much the opposite of joy or gratitude.
So I always like to remind everyone about Hebb's Law,
Neurons that fire together wire together.
And if you're embodying these messages of fear and anxiety and stress all day long,
You're carving those neural pathways.
So what might seem indulgent to set aside time for play or joy or gratitude is actually really healing for you and helps for resilience in the brain body.
So that's why we're going to practice this today.
And hopefully you've got an experience ready.
So you're always invited to close the eyes never required.
I'm just closing the eyes now if that feels right for you.
Sitting comfortably wherever you are.
Just beginning with a quick body scan.
So starting down at the tips of the toes,
Work up through the arches and soles of the feet,
Ankles,
Heels,
Calves,
Shins,
Knees,
Front and backs of the thighs.
Relax the glutes and the hips.
The belly,
The torso,
Spine,
Shoulder blades,
Fingers,
Hands,
Wrists,
Forearms,
Elbows,
Upper arms,
Shoulders,
Collarbones,
Chest,
Front and back of the neck.
Jaw,
Soften the muscles of the face,
The lips,
Nose,
Eyeballs,
Eyebrows,
Eyelids,
Forehead,
Top of the head.
Mindfulness of body and now mindfulness of breath.
Notice the breath to begin.
And then start breathing in and out through the nostrils down into a soft belly.
Soft belly expanding fully with each inhalation and contracting with your exhalation.
Nice smooth transitions there.
Now bringing awareness to your heartbeat in the center of your chest.
Noticing the heartbeat to begin.
And then spread awareness from the heartbeat down into the fingertips.
See if you can find your heartbeat pulsating there in the tips of your fingers.
And then return your awareness back up to the center of the chest.
Heartbeat in the center of the body.
Now the same way you extended awareness to the fingertips,
Now spread that awareness throughout the entire body down to the tips of the toes,
Up to the top of the head.
Synchronizing every cell of your being with your conscious awareness.
And now remembering that experience of joy.
Put yourself in the first person back in that memory as you live in that special moment or that special day and notice any changes in the body.
Notice any sensations,
Any tingling or changes in temperature.
Notice any changes in the muscles of the face,
Impulse to smile,
Any senses of heaviness or lightness in different parts of the body,
The sense of feeling relaxed or maybe even a little tense around the mouth or in the neck and shoulders as you get excited.
Embody this feeling of joy.
Remember it.
Experience it as if it's happening right now.
Feel it.
Feel into the heart space.
Experience joy in the heart space.
Anchor into this feeling in the whole body.
Now as you stay anchored in this feeling,
Bring your awareness to the dark space behind your closed eyes.
Stay with the feeling in your body.
Embodying joy.
Now as you move throughout the rest of your day,
The rest of your week,
Taking opportunities to cultivate this feeling and this experience.
So maybe as you take that first sip of coffee or you see a colleague or a friend you haven't seen in a while,
Experiencing,
Embodying,
Feeling joy throughout the whole body into the heart space and in the mind.
So you can stay right where you are as long as you'd like.
When you're ready,
You might blink the eyes open.
So that concludes our practice.
Thank you guys for showing up today.
If you are a faculty member and interested in having me work with you on something for your students,
Please don't hesitate to reach out.
I love to work closely with people and kind of design things especially for their students and their curriculum.
Please remember to embody joy as you go throughout the day.
Look for those tiny opportunities,
Small things,
Big things and feeling it in the whole body and in the heart.
Thank you so much.
