Welcome to your meditation and self touch practice.
Today the focus is on using self touch to comfort ourselves.
If you would like to grab a blanket or just an extra layer of clothes to provide that feeling of being in a warm hug,
I encourage you to do so.
And when you are ready,
I invite you to meet me in a comfortable seat.
Sitting on the earth,
On a cushion,
Or perhaps on a chair.
Allow your body to be held by the earth.
If it's comfortable for you,
You might start to soften the gaze or even allow the eyelids to close.
Allow your beautiful belly to fall out and the shoulders to drop.
Whatever you are carrying,
Whatever you are holding,
Can you let the earth and this practice hold it for you?
If only for a moment.
Allow yourself to be supported.
How is your breath?
Can you breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth?
Perhaps you can breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth.
Perhaps you feel more comfortable allowing the breath to transfer both in and out of the nose.
Perhaps today your exhales need to be more audible with a sigh,
A scream,
A moan.
For the next five breaths,
Breathe as you need in this moment.
Stay with the breath that you need and start to drop the awareness into your hands.
Your hands are an extension of your heart.
Visualize and imagine who you would like to reach out and comfort with your hands.
Hold that image of that person in your mind's eye.
Bring the awareness back to the hands,
To the palms,
And bring the palms together to touch.
Press palm into palm and feel the texture of your skin meeting.
And then,
As you breathe in through the mouth,
Press palm into palm and feel the texture of your skin meeting.
Start to slide the hands up and down,
Rubbing the hands in this linear motion at first to explore the texture of your skin,
The cracks,
The softness.
And then,
As you apply more pressure,
Start to increase the rate in which you rub the hands up and down,
Up and down,
Until you start to feel warmth,
Heat,
Fire.
Take three more breaths here,
Connecting to the hands and creating that warmth in the palms.
And then allow the palms to gently separate about an inch or two away from each other,
Palms still facing palm,
Shoulders relaxed.
Tap into that energy that you might feel between the palms here.
That energy is your energy,
What exists outside of your physical body that you cannot see but that you can feel.
Using this energy for comfort for yourself,
Take your right hand,
Your right palm,
And start to slide it and tuck it underneath of your left armpit.
Glue that left arm bicep to the side body,
Gentle pressure on that right hand.
And then take your left hand in palm and bring it over to the outside of the right arm,
The bicep,
The fleshy part of that upper arm,
And gently squeeze.
In this self hold,
You're creating the sensation of a hug.
Breathe here.
Comfort yourself and feel your breath.
As you inhale and it meets your arm,
And as you exhale,
You pull yourself closer in an embrace.
The invitation is to add a gentle rocking motion from side to side,
Turning the body softly and ever so slightly to the right and to the left.
Soothing shimmy perhaps.
Take three more breaths here.
Breathe into the boundaries of your skin,
The edges of your body.
In your next exhale,
Release the embrace and the hands fall down.
Taking your right hand now and lifting it up,
Placing the palm of the right hand into the centre of your chest,
Around your sternum perhaps,
Or just slightly over to the left where you imagine your heart would be.
Apply pressure of the right palm onto the chest and then gently start to create circular motions up and around.
It's very subtle,
It's very soft,
But it's there as you gently circle and provide comfort to your heart.
As you keep your right palm onto your chest,
Start to tap the fingertips up and down.
Tap,
Tap,
Tap,
Tap,
Tap,
Tap,
Tap.
Find your own rhythm.
Start to breathe in for four to five taps and breathe out for four to five taps.
Tap,
Tap out.
Inhaling to taps and exhaling.
Get lost in the rhythm that you are creating.
Perhaps even using the taps to focus on extending the length of inhales and exhales.
Four more cycles of breath here.
Tap,
Tap,
Tap.
Allow your hands to fall.
Allow the body to soften.
Come back to breath.
Come back to picturing and visualizing and calling in that person that you would like to comfort,
That you would like to wrap up in your arms and hold close to your chest.
And as you breathe for yourself,
You also breathe for them.
As you comfort yourself,
You comfort them.
Stay with this image,
This breath as long as you need.
Return back to the self touch practices of the self hold or the heart tapping with breath.
Remind yourself just how strong and resilient you are and take comfort in knowing that you are supported.
Take an inhale breath and an exhale breath.
Breathe into the body and breathe out.
Stay as long as you need.
