Hey,
My name is Alexandra and welcome to trusting yourself today.
So I want to invite you to cultivate a sense of confidence in yourself.
It might help you to handle the facts of life better and allow internal trust to arise.
This all happens when we befriend our minds.
So let's begin whenever you're ready.
You can simply begin by softening the gaze or close the eyes.
And taking a few moments to allow yourself to arrive in a space of stillness.
And sometimes it's helpful to express a form of gratitude for this opportunity to take care of the most important things.
Take care of the mind and the body.
And if you like you can also go ahead and set an intention for today's practice.
And with an open mind notice what arises.
Meet your experience with a listening presence.
And see if there's anything important that arises in the body at this time.
A longing,
An aspiration to know yourself,
To nurture yourself.
And whatever the intention may be,
Allowing it to fall towards the background of your mind now.
And remember to let this practice be guided from moment to moment with a gentle attention inwards.
And of course by making contact with your breath.
And simply noticing where in the body the breath begins to manifest.
And with ease settling your mind into that rhythm.
Notice how it feels to align to the natural beginning,
To settle into the softening of the sensations through the belly.
And just continue to receive its expression as it travels throughout the body.
Rather than needing to control the presence of the breath,
Needing to organize your experience.
And to align that with your expectations,
Trust that you can see into the breath.
Do you notice how the breath naturally carries this attention through gentle kind movement?
When your attention wanders,
Know simply what the mind does.
And rather than defaulting to criticism or getting swept away by a story about your capacity to practice,
Notice how it would feel to embrace that experience,
Softening into a wandering mind.
Awakening to the opportunity to return back to presence within tender touch.
Softening back into the moment that is right now.
And continuing to notice how the breath moves throughout the body.
Notice the difference between receiving the breath with openness and trying to control its presence.
The distinction between softening into fixing and trust that you continue to receive your experience as it is.
You might notice as long as we are sitting uncomfortable,
Perhaps even painful sensations.
And then you can breathe deeply into yourself.
Breathing into areas of tightness,
Tension,
Just as you continue to relax into the unfolding.
So as you do so,
By practicing this with your breath,
You will gain more trust in the same way with the experience of your life.
You know as you switch your perspective from that need to control your experience,
It just is a representation of lack of self-trust,
A fear that you might not be able to handle things your way.
But trust me on this.
As we train the mind to trust the breath and to identify how the body knows how to breathe,
Just as the breath knows exactly how to express itself,
You can receive the experience of life navigating your experience with grace,
With clarity and with focus.
These are qualities of the mind that you can start strengthening with this practice.
Again,
Allow not to fall back into all berating criticism,
But continue to soften into the breath knowing perfectly well.
And by practicing this,
Everything else will spiral out and expand into your life,
Or softening into life.
Breathe in and trust that you are able to receive as you do.
And with ease,
Breathe out,
Being able to let go what needs to go.
And as we're slowly coming back up,
Bring your mind back to the intention you had at the beginning of this practice.
Remain connected to the aspiration of your heart and holding these things softly within yourself,
Knowing that you can receive and that you can let go.
Gently take a deep breath in and when you're ready,
Completely breathe out.
Open your eyes,
Lift the gaze,
Welcome back to this beautiful world.
I hope you have a beautiful day or a beautiful night and I'm looking forward to meeting you in the next meditation.
