Begin this meditation by finding your most comfortable seat,
Honoring the practice by starting with awareness,
Starting with the breath.
Put one hand inside the other,
Rest the hands on your lap,
And we'll start with the breath.
To connect to your natural rhythm,
Connect to the breath just as it is in your body right now.
Let your awareness be broad and let your awareness be on every inhale and every exhale.
Every time you inhale,
Say in your own mind the word inhale,
And each time you exhale,
Say in your own mind the word exhale.
Begin now for about two minutes,
And when the mind wanders,
Bring it back to the breath.
Noticing where your mind is and keeping your eyes closed and bringing the mind back to the breath,
To the words inhale,
Exhale.
Stay with the words inhale,
Exhale for just a couple more moments.
And now imagine that you are sitting here right now as your most resilient self,
That you have the qualities of resilience that you have been thinking about.
You have the qualities of calm and patience and compassion and courage.
Imagine yourself sitting here as the most authentic,
Grounded version of yourself.
See what that person's face looks like,
That version of you,
And your body posture.
Connect to that groundedness and that joy of knowing you can face anything.
Feel into this version of you,
Feel into this character that looks at the world with calm and courage because you know you have that huge resource of resilience.
See that version of you.
Unflappable.
Humble.
Open-hearted.
And as this resilient being,
You have wisdom.
You can look to the core of things.
And you also have the wisdom that a lot is not under our control.
You have the wisdom that everything that's happening to you is helping you grow.
You understand that you were given a difficult brain to begin with.
It was designed for you in advance,
And it's a brain that can overreact.
And through all those reactions,
All that matters is your intention.
What matters is the intention with which you meet the moment.
You have this deep wisdom to see the bird's eye view.
You have the wisdom to get a spacious view of each and every situation.
As if you were standing at the very top of the mountain,
Looking down at what is happening,
And you can see what went before,
What will go after.
You can see the full picture.
And with wisdom,
With this calm,
You can look at the realities of life for what they are.
And see yourself as having great inner strength.
You can look adversity right in the face.
With calm,
You can look at reality just as it is.
To feel your strength,
Just become aware of your body sitting in this chair.
Feel the energy running up and down your spine,
And this energy running through your arms and your hands.
Feel that you are sitting upright with dignity.
And every cell in your body was passed down to you by ancestors who also survived by thousands of other people who were also survivors on this earth and had strength and resilience.
And they passed on that strength to you.
That your DNA is the DNA of people who have faced every situation on this earth,
Who have faced every set of circumstances and survived.
Feel that strength in you.
In your genetic memory,
You have the ability to face any situation that comes your way.
So sitting with dignity,
Feeling the energy in your body,
Feeling that you have this strength,
You have this resilience.
And the final quality of your resilient self is total compassion.
If you had unconditional compassion and self-compassion for every being,
For yourself,
For the difficult people in your life,
What would that be like?
You are gentle with yourself in all moments,
And that makes you resilient.
And you are gentle with others.
You can give them the generosity of your compassion.
You have this commitment to wisdom and to strength,
And this commitment to compassion in any situation.
Imagining yourself with these qualities.
And knowing that you can access them in any situation by simply asking yourself,
What would my resilient self look like?
What would my resilient self act like?
Accessing the strength,
The wisdom,
The compassion,
Your own resilience.
And now take a deep breath in.
Take a deep breath out through the mouth.
Thank your resilient self for showing up.
And thank yourself for doing this meditation practice.
