Mindful Breathing

Spend a few minutes to slow down and catch your breath, and you’ll be glad that you did. Whether to begin the day, as a transition, or to deal with in-the-moment stress, breathing slowly and deeply settles your nervous system so that you can feel more grounded and calm.

Transcript

Welcome to this five minute mindful breathing meditation with Katie Dutcher.

Finding yourself in a comfortable seated or lying down posture.

And if you're comfortable doing so,

Letting your eyes close.

We'll begin by slowing down the breath.

Breathing in slowly through your nose,

Feeling expansion throughout the chest,

The belly,

And then breathing out even more slowly.

If you would,

Just pursing your lips slightly,

Breathing out through the mouth.

Continuing with a few more long slow breaths just like this.

As you release this breath of air slowly and completely,

Perhaps there is something else that you can release in this moment.

You might tune in to the area around the eyes or the jaw just to soften and to let go as you release the breath.

The shoulders are tight or tensed upwards inviting this long slow exhalation to release the shoulders to let your whole body perhaps find a little bit more ease settling into your seat.

One more long slow breath.

And now just releasing control of the breath,

Letting your breath find its own rhythm,

Its own natural pace coming and going.

So now this movement of the breath is a little more gentle,

A little more subtle.

Seeing if you can still track its movement through the body.

The lift of the inhalation,

The release of the exhalation.

The mind will wander elsewhere and then just coming back,

Feeling your breath coming and going.

In a moment we'll bring this short meditation to a close.

Just taking a moment perhaps to smile,

To thank yourself for this gift of pausing and being present.

Recalling that at any time today and beyond you can return to this soft slow breath to steady and to soothe.

Listening now to the sound of the bell.

The sound of the bell.