Good morning and welcome to the artist's morning.
My name is Darius and I am very grateful that you and I get this time together.
Our meditation practice today will be on the theme of connecting with our now.
Connecting with the truth,
Our truth,
Our hearts truth in this moment.
It's very easy to focus on the future,
What needs to get done,
What we want to get done,
What could get done.
It's equally easy to focus on the past,
What's already happened,
What we did,
What we didn't do.
There's nothing wrong with either of those things.
And there is power here in this moment.
There is truth and there is liberation.
I've said this before many times.
My meditations are not about helping you feel better,
But rather an opportunity to practice so that we can get better at feeling.
In order to do that,
We need to create a safe space and permission for us to feel all of our feelings.
Let's begin our meditation.
Your eyes are open.
I'd like to invite you to gently close them now and let's go inwards together.
Going nice and slow.
Starting to take deeper breaths.
Each deep breath,
Imagining you are going closer into your heart.
Deeper.
Into your truth,
Into what's here,
What's real,
What's accessible for you now.
Let's take a few deep breaths here together.
Breathing in.
Holding at the top for a moment.
And letting it all go.
Once again,
Big breath in.
Maybe bringing your shoulders up with your inhale.
Breathing and letting it all go and dropping your shoulders.
Last big breath here together.
If you're open to it,
Making some noise with your exhale.
Breathing in.
Shoulders up,
Holding at the top.
Big sigh as we release and let go.
Just taking a moment to notice if anything's changed here.
All answers are welcome.
If you are sitting,
I'd like to ask you to make your spine as tall as possible.
Don't overdo it,
It should still feel calm.
There's a center point here.
If you can access it,
It's wonderful.
It's connected to your heart space,
To your core.
And it's very easy to lose.
Noticing your thoughts.
If your thoughts go to the future,
To what you need to do today,
This week,
This year,
I want you to imagine leaning forward.
And just,
Just ever so slightly lean forward following your future thoughts.
And if you notice your thoughts going to the past,
What happened yesterday,
What happened years ago,
What you did,
What you didn't do,
You lean backwards.
Ever so slightly,
We are constantly being pulled out of our center,
Forward and back.
Forward and back.
And the illusion is that the world pulls us and pushes us.
But it's us.
Can you stay here in your center,
In this moment,
In the now?
What do you feel?
Can you stay here?
In this moment of silence,
Perhaps your ability to feel is heightened here.
When we remove judgment from the feeling,
Whether it's fear or love,
Whether it's joy or pain,
Just allowing what's actually here,
What's accessible to be here.
And notice if your mind consciously or unconsciously checks out,
If it goes into the future thoughts,
I want you to gently lean forward and repeat the mantra.
Forward,
Forward,
Forward.
If it goes into the past,
Gently move backward and repeat the mantra.
Backward,
Backward,
Backward.
And if you are able,
See if you can come back to your center and feel what's here now.
And notice if your mind consciously or unconsciously checks out,
If it goes into the future thoughts,
If it goes into the past,
Gently move backward and repeat the mantra.
It can be challenging.
We have trained ourselves to seek what feels good and both forward and backward are illusions and often coping mechanisms.
Today's meditation is a practice to allow you to safely practice feeling what's here now.
Maybe that was easy for you and maybe that was very difficult.
My belief is giving ourselves space and permission to have access to all of our feelings is a powerful path to liberation.
It takes courage and tenacity to be honest with how our hearts are truly doing in this moment.
It takes courage to acknowledge fear and it takes courage to acknowledge love.
I'm going to stay quiet for the rest of this final song.
Give you some more space and time to sit with the truth of your heart in this moment.
I'm going to stay quiet for the rest of this final song.
Give you some more space and time to sit with the truth of your heart in this moment.
Bravo,
Dear artist.
You made it to the end of our practice today.
Give ourselves a moment to land here.
You're open to it.
Place one or two hands on your heart.
Let's share a little gratitude for this big,
Beautiful heart of yours.
Thank you for being here with me,
For being here with us,
For being here with your heart in this moment.
For those of us joining in on the live artist's morning,
I'm going to put 20 minutes on the clock and allow us to do some private,
Personal journaling.
If you're catching us on a replay,
Perhaps on Insight Timer,
Of course you could do the same.
Put some time on your clock and really just sit and be with what's here,
What's accessible,
Possible journaling prompt to get you started could be,
How is your heart right now?
Does it long for anything?
Is it excited by anything?
Is there anything your heart would like to share with you?
The key here is to be open and really listen to what your heart has to say and share.
Thank you once again for meditating with me.
My name is Darius and I will see you next time.
