Welcome to the stability meditation.
Starting off by just getting in a comfortable position,
Whether that's lying down with a straight spine or sitting in a position of ease yet alertness,
Bringing your attention downwards to the abdomen,
Breathing in,
Arousing,
And focusing your attention,
And breathing out and deeply relaxing and releasing any busyness of mind,
Any tension in the body,
While sustaining that sense of awareness throughout the breathing and the abdomen,
Arousing on the inhalation,
Releasing,
Relaxing on the exhalation.
And now we'll introduce this practice to support stability of attention with counting.
And so at the very end of each inhalation,
Just before an exhalation,
You just mentally,
Briefly,
In your mind,
Just say one.
And continue with what we're doing on the exhalation,
Just breathe out,
Releasing,
Relaxing,
Maintaining that sense of mindfulness,
Awareness.
So as the breath flows in and gets to the top of that inhalation,
Then you say two,
Just very quickly.
Not a long counting,
Such as two,
But just two,
Just succinctly.
In between the counts,
There's silence.
And so you can continue this by counting up to ten,
And then restarting again,
Or you can count as high as you want,
Just keeping the counting going.
And if at any point you want to drop the counting and just continue with the breathing,
That's okay too,
Just maintaining that sense of awareness and seeing if there's a support with the stability of your attention.
And should you want to come back to the counting,
Then come back to it.
And so just playing with this as a support for the stability of your attention.
Breathing in,
Arousing attention at the end of the inhalation,
One.
Breathing out,
Releasing,
Relaxing,
Letting be,
Continuing on.
And bringing mindfulness to the moment,
Noticing if you've lost count,
Or if your mind's gone into dullness,
Sleepiness,
Or if it's gone into busyness.
Then just gently bringing it back,
Relaxing the body,
Noticing how the intention here isn't to focus on the numbers.
The intention is still to focus on and being aware of the breathing,
And the numbers are just at the end of the inhalation,
Just to support attentional ability.
Just punctuating the moment.
Breathing in,
Arousing attention,
Breathing out,
Releasing,
Relaxing.
At the end of the inhalation,
Beginning counting again.
So bringing awareness to the quality of your attention right now.
If it seems like it's maintaining or sustaining attention,
Or if it seems like it's going into dullness or more distracted busyness,
Gently coming back.
And also checking in with your body,
Noticing if it's relaxed,
Soft,
Making sure that the body's just naturally breathing,
Unconstrained,
Not forcing it in any way.
Settling into that space,
And then coming back to supporting your practice through the counting,
Or letting it be.
Allowing for a sense of awareness to permeate through your entire experience,
Through the inhalation,
Through the exhalation.
And now we'll continue in silence throughout the rest of the practice.
And in a moment you'll hear the sound of a bell,
And that'll be the end of this practice.
But as we always do,
Just that moment of acknowledgement,
Of acknowledging yourself,
The choice you make,
To create this space for your own learning,
Health,
And well-being.
It's the deep act of self-care,
Acknowledging yourself for taking this time.
