Welcome.
Today I'm leading us through a short meditation to help us realign with presence and quiet this mind that many of us have,
Which is called the if-only mind.
So we're quieting the if-only mind and welcoming in presence.
It'll be just about a 10 minute meditation.
And I will lead us through and share with you a bit about what I'm talking about here.
So the if-only mind is the mind that says,
If only I have more fill in the blank,
Then I will be fulfilled.
If only I have blank,
I will feel whole.
If only I had blank,
I would be.
It's this frankly delusional thinking of wanting life to be different than it is right now.
And in some ways,
Of course,
I love dreaming.
Dreaming is so important for us.
But this is not that.
This is I would be happy if conditions,
And it's a trap,
In my opinion.
And so this can happen to us in our day.
And this is a simple meditation that I want you to bring forward.
If you find yourself getting caught in the if-only mind,
And you can root yourself back to actually what's going on right here,
Okay?
So sit up nice and tall,
Aligning vertically with source,
Your crown,
The top of your head going towards the sky and your feet or your seat on the earth.
Breathing in fully and breathing out fully.
Breathing in and breathing out.
Keeping your breath going just like this.
You can keep your eyes open if that feels best for you,
Allowing a soft gaze,
Or you can close your eyes.
Knowing that you can always come back to the breath.
You can always come back to what you hear around you.
And frankly,
This is our job,
Just being here with what's around us.
And noticing when we get caught in the if-only mind,
And we redirect.
Perhaps you notice that there's an if-only statement that's arising,
And this is the perfect opportunity for you to bring yourself back to what you can see,
What you can see even behind your closed eyes.
If you have the gift of sight,
It's an opportunity for you to notice what you feel in your body,
Where you feel openness,
Or where you feel constriction,
Where you feel aliveness,
Where energy is flowing,
Or perhaps where you feel collapse.
Simply noticing what's happening right now,
Aligning yourself with this frequency of right now,
Of presence.
Breathing deeply into the low belly,
Which sends a sense of safety into the body.
And if you ever don't feel safe,
You can look around you,
Turn your head,
Open your eyes,
Turn on the felt sense of your animalistic body,
And say,
Am I safe?
Is there anything coming to get me right now?
Okay,
The answer is no.
Breathe deeply.
If the answer is yes,
Make action,
Take action,
Do what you need to do to get yourself into a safe place.
Our bodies live oftentimes in this world in a hypervigilant state,
In a fight or flight state.
It is our job to bring ourselves into this moment and ask ourselves,
Do we need to be in this hypervigilant state?
If the answer is no,
We do not need to be in fight or flight.
Nothing is coming to hurt me.
We can train ourselves through deep breaths into the low belly,
The diaphragmatic breath,
And then releasing the air out of the nose over and over and over to send relaxation through the body.
This is our work.
This takes us out of the busy,
If only,
Mind and brings us here where we have agency,
Where we can actually respond to life as it's unfolding.
Take a few more deep breaths with yourself for the last couple of moments.
When we practice bringing ourselves into the moment now,
When we find ourselves in the daydreaming or the mind wandering of,
If only mind,
We can bring ourselves back and do this practice,
But we have to start on the cushion,
Practicing in silence,
Practicing on our own so that when we're in our lives and things are moving and life is busy,
Oh,
Yeah,
We practice this.
We know how to bring ourselves back away from the if only mind,
Which isn't even real,
And bring ourselves into this present moment where life is happening.
When we live in if only mind,
We miss our lives.
We miss it.
We're not even here.
We're somewhere else.
And so I invite you,
I beg you to be here for your life.
Be here,
Enjoy it,
Breathe,
Love.
That's about it,
In my view,
Anyway.
Thank you for doing what you can to change your mind,
To change your thoughts,
And to realign with presence so that we can create peace.
That's what I believe we're here to do,
And this step today is a part of that process.
We need that so much.
For all of us,
We need that.
