Rest Your Eyes & Calm Your Nervous System

Treat your eyes to this relaxing and nourishing movement meditation, and feel the difference. Either from straining while using screens a lot, reading, or general stress, your eyes deserve a rest. They play a big role in the overall health of your nervous system, and many times go unnoticed until headaches or neck pain appear.

Giving yourself self-care and nurturing can begin here. Close your eyes, take a deep breath, and be guided into relaxation, calm, and peace.

Transcript

Please find a comfortable place where you can lie down,

Preferably in a quiet room where you won't be interrupted.

Lie on the floor,

Spread out and remove your jewelry,

Glasses,

Belts.

Take a moment to sense what is in contact with the floor,

The parts of your body that you feel really touching.

Notice the direction of your spine,

Your head,

Your legs,

Your arms.

And see if you can tell to yourself,

In your mind's eye,

What is the type of contact that you have of your midline.

So the line of the middle,

The line between the top of your head and your pubic area,

Your anus,

The spine,

The line of the spine.

How much contact is there?

Where do you feel the spine touching the floor,

Pressure against the floor and which areas are raised away from the floor without contact.

Now bring the palms of your hands over your eyes and cover your eyes slightly so you block away all the light from the room without putting pressure on your eyeballs.

You can gently overlap the fingers,

Use the wider part of your palm to cover your eyeballs,

Your eye sockets.

And just take a note of the kind of color or absence of color that you can see with your eyes closed.

See in your eyelids.

And this can be black,

Blue,

Sparks of light,

Colors.

Now leave this,

The hands on the sides of your body.

And again,

Sense the contact of your spine.

This time breathe into this sensation.

And now lift one of your hands,

Whichever arm feels lighter or doesn't hurt at all to lift and place the palm of your hand in front of your face so you can see it.

Look at your palm with as much detail as you can.

And then when you feel you've seen your hand enough and you know your hand,

You can close your eyes but still keep looking at the hand with your eyes closed.

And begin now to move your hand in space.

You close your eyes.

Keep looking at your hand with closed eyes.

And begin to move the hand in space now a little bit to the right,

A little bit in front,

Above your head but keep tracking the hand with your eyes.

So you move the hand as far away from your face as you want to and keep your eyes closed and keep looking at the hand with your closed eyes.

And take it far to the left and far to the right as you breathe,

Even further than what you could possibly see if your eyes were open.

But you continue tracking the hand with your eyes closed.

Keep imagining the palm of your hand even if the hand is behind you,

Above your head or below your face,

Closer to your legs.

And just sense the movement of your eyes,

The musculature around your eyes as you follow your hand.

Just breathe.

Now leave this again,

Leave it alone and place your hands over your face again,

Covering your eyeballs,

Covering your eyes.

Gently so there's no pressure on the eyeballs but also tight enough that there's no light coming in from outside.

And see what you can see.

Is there a little bit more black anywhere?

More dark blue?

Can you take a patch of darkness and spread it?

Make it larger.

Now for the next movement,

You can keep your legs long or bend your knees if it's uncomfortable to keep your legs long.

Interlace your hands and place them over your chest.

And now begin to make a slight rotation with your wrists as if you wanted to see the back of your hands and then the palm side of your hands.

So you move the hands interlaced as they are,

A little bit around themselves,

Just rotating your arms,

Rotating your forearms so you can see the back of your hands and your nails and then the palm of your hands.

That's right.

And do it a little smaller and a little faster.

So you go,

Bup,

Bup,

Bup,

Bup.

And keep your eyes closed but look down at your hands as you continue doing this rotation,

Small and a little faster.

And as you breathe now,

Begin to take your hands all the way down,

Turning as they are,

All the way down,

Brushing your sternum all the way towards your pubic bone,

Your pelvis.

So you continue turning them,

Looking at the back and the palms,

Making light,

Small,

Fast movements,

Reducing the effort on your wrists and arms.

So it's not a lot of work to do this movement with the hands.

And you brush the front of yourself,

Your sternum,

Your belly,

Belly button,

All the way down to the pelvis and then back up,

Following your hands with your eyes.

See how can you make the movement of the hands really simple?

You can change the speed,

You can change the size of it to make it less and less of an effort.

And when you reach either the top or the lower part of your chest again,

Then bring the hands a little bit over to the left side.

And in the same way,

Brush the whole left side of your chest from the shoulder all the way to the left hip joint and let your eyes follow the hands,

Even if your eyes are closed,

Preferably if the eyes are closed.

Simplify the brushing,

Keep your breath free and continue moving gently.

If you need to,

You can take a little rest.

When you rest,

You place the palms over your eyes again,

Covering the light and just checking for differences.

See what can you see with your eyes closed?

What is your field of vision like?

Is it getting calmer?

We can detect nervous system activity by the amount of color or flashing lights,

Electric impulses that you can detect with the eyes closed in the darkness of the vision field.

And you can detect a quiet nervous system by the amount of darkness,

Moisture-like,

Velvety texture of this field of vision with your eyes closed.

When you're ready to resume the movement,

Interlace your fingers in the non-habitual way.

So it's your other index that is on top.

And continue brushing now the right side of your chest from your shoulder all the way to the right hip joint in a very small and little fast movement of rotating the wrists as if you could see your rings and the palm of the hand simply,

Lightly brushing all the way down to the hip joint and back up again.

Breathing,

Following the hands with your eyes.

When you reach the shoulder again,

Go across the middle of your chest and then all the way to the left shoulder and then down onto the left hip.

So you brush now the left side of your chest.

Let's write a simple,

Easy movement with your hands,

Easy to follow with your eyes as you keep breathing.

When you find the left hip joint,

Go through the middle of your pelvis and to the right side and all the way up the right shoulder.

See if you can create even a little more space inside your mouth.

And when you reach the top of your chest again,

You can find the middle and go down the middle another time or two just to see how much easier is this movement now compared with the first time you did it.

And how clear is for you the middle,

The line that is not over the right or over the left.

Now stop the movement,

Palm your eyes again,

See what's different.

When you're ready,

Please leave this and lie on your stomach.

So you're finding yourself on your belly.

You can place one hand on top of the other with the palms up and your forehead on the hands.

Make yourself comfortable in this position.

Spread your legs,

Take a breath.

And now imagine that right front and center in between your eyes,

There's a ball,

A white ball,

Like a golf ball.

And now let this ball fall down into the center of the earth and follow it with your eyes.

This imaginary golf ball that is sinking down and going further and further and further away from you,

Disappearing into the core of the earth.

And then let it come back again and be very,

Very tiny,

Far away.

And you follow it with your eyes as it gets closer and closer.

Midway becomes the size of a golf ball again and then it gets closer and bigger,

Closer and bigger as it gets very,

Very close all the way in front of your face again.

And it can be as big as you want it to be provided it doesn't scare you.

And then a couple of times let the ball again fall down into the center of the earth and you follow it with your eyes until it gets so small that it disappears.

And then let it return again and you follow it as it gets closer and bigger,

Closer and bigger until it's again right in front of your face.

And see if you can do this a couple more times very fast without holding your breath.

You zoom the ball out,

You zoom it back in and you follow it with your eyes all along.

Notice the change in the musculature around your eyes as you do this imaginary movement and how the focus of your eyes changes to adjust to the imaginary ball.

If you can keep your breath free and your teeth not tight,

You may feel the musculature around the eyes adjusting to your intention just like the shutter of a camera.

Closing and tightening and then opening and widening again depending on where the imaginary ball is.

Now leave this and take a little rest.

Place now this imaginary ball or pearl or marble in front of you somewhere that is easy for you to imagine it.

Not too far,

Not too close.

And now continue to follow this pearl or marble with your eyes as you move it to the right.

Move the imaginary ball,

Marble,

To the right as far as you could see it and follow it with your eyes.

And then let it return to the middle.

So take it just to the right and then back to the middle and see if you can tell how differently your eyes are working.

How much more work is the right eye doing compared with the left?

The musculature around the eyeball on the right side.

The impulses,

Any light flashes or sparks of color.

Now let the ball go all the way to the left and follow it with your eyes again and see how different this is.

Follow your right eye to follow the marble,

The imaginary pearl all the way to the left until it disappears in the corner of your left eye.

Without holding your breath,

Continue moving the marble from left to right,

Taking rests in between.

Continue in the whole horizon.

An imaginary ball in the actual movement of your eyes tracking it.

See if you can do it without clenching your teeth or tightening your forehead and frowning with a soft and open relaxed face.

Now stop for a moment,

Reset.

Take a moment to create a blank page for your attention and now once or twice just zoom the ball out far away into the center of the earth and then bring it back up and see if it's easier for you to do this now.

To follow it as it goes away and gets really tiny and then comes back up to the middle of your face.

See if it's easier for you to do it very quickly.

And then please leave it,

Lie on your back again,

Cover your eyes,

See what is different.

What has changed for your attention,

For the quality of your nervous system,

For that darkness,

That blue,

Black,

Velvety texture behind your eyelids with your eyes closed.

Now please take your hands away from your eyes,

Put them on the sides of your body and take a moment to really let gravity affect your eyes in the same way that is affecting the rest of your musculature and organs and senses.

In other words,

Imagine the musculature supporting the eyeballs as if it was a series of hammocks or hands holding each eyeball and let the eyeballs really sink and rest into this musculature,

Into this support.

As if gravity can also push down and let the eyes sink even further.

And now from this place of rest of your eyes,

Allow the eyes to track the line of your legs.

So let the right eye follow the line of your right leg.

You can imagine you could see your right hip joint,

Your right knee,

Your right toe,

Big toe and then back up.

And then let the left eye follow the left hip joint,

The left knee,

The left foot.

And then if you feel adventurous,

Maybe both of them together so you're looking down as if you could see your hip joints,

Your knees,

Your feet.

But just using your eyes with your eyes closed and these imaginary parallel lines or tracks so your eyes are not anymore with one point of focus like you were just with the little marble but now they're separated into two.

And take the eyes down in this way a couple times until you're familiar with this idea of the eyes running each one on its own separate track.

And then bring them up again as if you could see now your shoulders and the space above the shoulders.

And see if the eyes want to jump into one point again or they are able to maintain their separate tracks.

And go very fast now from the highest that you can look at to the middle to the lowest from the feet all the way to the top of your head just using your eyes in this way as they float so even though it's a fast movement you're not hurrying or getting out of yourself.

And then leave it,

Palm your eyes one more time and see what is the color like what is the space behind your closed eyelids.

See if you can find a patch of dark blue or black and make it bigger spread it make it wider.

Breathe into this darkness the absence of electrical impulses and very quiet nervous system activity.

And when you feel ready please keep your eyes closed and roll to one side or the other and come to sit keeping the eyes closed.

Notice the transition between having your head on the ground to having your head now standing at the top of the spine.

And when you're ready very very slowly begin to open your eyelids as if you were lifting a curtain very very slowly.

Very very slowly until your eyes are just open not fully open but just open and see if you have a habit of dropping your head down or popping your eyes out as if they were looking out at something and let the eyes come back back into their sockets as if you were still lying down and let the eyes sink down.

And the head on top of the spine and now very gently begin to look around yourself look around the space a little to the right and back and a little to the left and choose something from the room that you want to follow.

Could be a line,

Could be an object,

Could be a window or simply imagine this pearl or marble floating through space and you following it.

So you let the eyes lead the movement and the head follow.

You can do the same thing to the left,

Up,

Down and you're welcome to take this into nature and walk around and here and there just stopping to assess where are your eyes?

Are they in charge and leading?

Are they following the head?

Can they be affected by gravity and also find some rest or do they always have to pop out?

When you do go outside see if your perception of colors have changed and you can see more vibrancy in your surroundings.

Have a great day.

Reviews

This is really wonderful, i was Looks ng for something Like this! And will come Back to it 🎊 thank you very much 💜🙏🏼💜

Fascinating to work with just the eyes. Thank you 🙏🥰💝

I listened on a whim and I enjoyed this new way of meditating. Thank you 🙏🏼

Lovely … calming and relaxing.. thank you 😊

Very relaxing for the eyes, a very creative set of exercises! Thank you for sharing this 🙏

Very different. The mind exercises were good for grounding. Thank you

wow. really enjoyed this experience. amazing how you feel it. thank you.

Thankyou Dayana. that was a great and different meditation. a good way to start my day and one to come back to.