Evening springtime.
Take a deep breath.
And prepare to relax.
As you settle your shoulders and soften your gaze.
You are listening to.
Being present with the body that you have right now.
Meditation in the Nocturne series which helps you settle in to the body when the body feels uncomfortable.
Bringing gentle body awareness.
I invite you to relax now.
As if you were being held in a safe and loving embrace.
Begin by allowing yourself to arrive.
Find a shape for the body that feels supported.
Allow your hands to rest with ease.
With the palms open or gently folded.
Let your shoulders fall away from the ears.
As you take a slow inhalation.
Expanding the chest wider and inviting the shoulders to roll back.
Release the tension from your jaw.
As the tongue rests softly in the mouth.
If you feel safe doing so.
Unfocus your gaze or close your eyes as quietness.
Begins to gather around you.
And within you.
You begin to widen the breath now I did.
First noticing how the body is already breathing.
Listen to its natural rhythm and movement.
With awareness comes deepening.
As you extend the inhalation.
And exhalation.
Watching breath roll through the body.
Where do you notice?
That the breath gathers.
You can bring your attention there.
As I guide you through a breathing pattern for five rounds of breath.
Each round of breath includes six moments of inhalation.
Followed by six moments of exhalation.
Before we begin.
Take one natural breath.
And we inhale.
4… 5… 6… And exhale,
4,
5,
6.
Inhale,
4,
5,
6.
Exhale,
4,
5,
6.
Inhale,
4,
5,
6.
Exhale,
4,
5,
6.
Inhale,
4,
5,
6.
Exhale,
4 5 6.
Inhale,
4 5 6.
Exhale,
4 5 6.
Allow yourself to breathe naturally once more.
As you bring your awareness.
To the top of your head.
The crown of your head begins to brighten with brightness.
Notice how the top of the mind space opens to receive quiet and kind energy.
You may even discern a subtle tingling sensation.
Arising there.
Let that quiet and kind energy drift down.
Across the forehead.
Smoothie.
The surface.
Softening the small furrows of accumulated worry.
Relax.
Relax as that soft energy flows across your eyes now.
The eye muscles loosen.
The cheek straw.
Dura Dura Draw,
Draw.
Like a feather across your cheeks.
This quiet and kind energy.
Glides from the apple of your cheeks outward toward your ears.
As your ears fall fall away from the mind.
A soft sanctuary has formed in the face.
As ease spreads down the nose and across the mouth.
And flows through the jaws.
Relax.
Settle the energy of the throat.
Inviting breath to thread through the fronts and back of the neck.
Soften the tenacious fibers of the throat.
Release.
Really.
The neck supports the cranium.
As a pillar of softness as the head floats upon it.
So light.
Relax.
On your next exhalation,
Your shoulders.
Decide to surrender.
All of the way.
They've been carrying.
Let it go.
Let it go.
Breath.
By breath now.
You let it go.
Let it go.
Your shoulders rest.
Like settling waves.
Move your awareness into the right arm.
Now the left.
Both arms grow heavy as they hang from the socket of the shoulders.
The elbows as stones fall toward the earth.
The tendon and sinew of your forearms.
Rest,
Like the strings of a quiet instrument,
Reverberating softly after a long song.
Across your chest now.
Space opens.
The space expands through the clavicles and radiates down,
Down.
To pull into the widest part of the ribcage.
Each rib bone opening.
As more space fills between the ribs.
Any tightness in the chest or in the heart moves outward,
Flowing through the open ribcage and out to be received by the air surrounding your body.
Let the heart fill and release.
And release.
With loving-kindness.
Your heart fills with love.
And releases any heaviness residing there.
Your heart is held in a soft flow of loving energy and spacious calm.
Inhale the spaciousness.
Exhale and soften.
Notice how your belly rises.
With your next inhalation.
The belly is safe to rise and fall with breath.
To move with the ebb and flow of energy.
You allow the abdomen to fill and flow with the quiet depth and gentle tides of cleansing oceanic breath.
Imagine the liver,
The intestines.
The kidneys.
The stomach.
The pancreas.
The spleen.
The reproductive organs,
The adrenal glands rinsed through with breath.
Breathe.
Your pelvic ball fills with that same oceanic movement,
A calm and nourishing sea.
The hip bones release their tension.
Falling away from each other.
Filling with the seafoam energy of oceanic breath.
Notice any points of contact where you are supported by the hips.
Feel the support there.
As you allow yourself to be held.
Release,
Release.
Now move your awareness into the legs.
Their thighs,
Knees.
Calves.
.
.
Shins.
.
.
And cold.
As breath fills the legs.
It travels like a ray of light down.
Down from the hips.
Through the front and back of the thighs.
It gathers at the front and back of the kneecap.
This delicate light swirls through each cap and cascades down the shin bones.
You let your ankles rest.
Space opens around them.
Full of light.
Your feet spark into your consciousness as slow waves of soft light move through them from heels to toes.
Heels to toes.
From heels to toes.
The breath guides the movement of awareness.
Let your feet be supported by the earth.
As you imagine the water-like quality of your breath seeping through the soles of your feet to moisten the earth beneath you.
Allow your entire body.
The whole body at once.
To be recognized as a single field of sensation.
Your body.
Is a unified presence.
It is a living house.
Of energy,
Bone,
Breath.
Liquid.
This is the body that is here.
You feel this body.
You meet this body with gentleness.
You allow yourself to continue to be present with this body.
Take the next several breaths to move more deeply into your body and listen for any messages that the body may wish to convey.
You meet your body with kindness.
You fill the body with love You are this body.
And you are this body's companion.
I invite you to rest now.
In the embrace of this body.
In the sensation of simply existing.
As you take several deep breaths.
Breathe.
As this meditation draws toward completion.
Imagine a soft light gathering around the entire body.
This subtle light slowly makes contact with elements of the external world.
You begin first to notice the temperature of the air on your skin.
And as you slowly wiggle your fingers.
And wiggle your toes.
You absorb the sensation of your limbs as they are painted back into the landscape.
You feel the texture of the surface you rest upon.
And you begin to hear more clearly the sounds nearby.
As you flutter open your eyes and take your time to focus them.
You take in the colors around you.
Your body has arrived back in space and time.
Welcome home.
If you enjoyed this meditation,
Please follow me evening springtime.
We'll meet again soon.
