Namaste.
Let your practice begin with resettling your body,
Your whole body almost sighing itself into position,
Beginning to relax your face and the muscles that trickle down from your neck into your shoulders,
Your back,
Your hips and your legs.
As your body arrives and you begin to feel a release into the way that you are sitting or lying,
Let all of your attention gather on the sensation of your breathing.
There's a rhythmic quality to your breathing,
One that you don't have to fix or change in any particular way as you watch it.
Becoming aware of the pathway that your breathing takes as it enters your body,
The pathway it takes as it leaves,
The way it takes as it enters your body,
The pathway it takes as it leaves,
Everything in your practice done with a balance of ease,
Attentiveness without over-efforting.
Take your next breath in through your nose and let it out with a sigh,
Repeating this breath again in through your nose,
Out with a sigh.
As you breathe in again,
Same sigh with your lips closed,
Repeating that breath in through your nose breath out,
Sighing with your lips closed,
Continuing this pattern,
Breath in through your nose,
Breath out with a sigh with your lips closed,
Hearing that soft rumble in the back of your throat,
With every exhale,
Beginning to cultivate Ujjayi breathing,
Translated as breath of victory.
Beginning to cultivate Ujjayi breathing,
Translated as breath of victory.
It's a breath that you can hear as you make it,
And that can be cultivated with that same sound as you inhale.
As with any breathing practice,
Any sense that you are over-efforting or losing your breath is a simple symptom,
A simple sign to release the breathing technique,
Return to normal breathing,
And only pick the breathing practice back up at your own pace.
And when you're ready,
I can still feel it for a moment,
There's still air in and out because that's where natural breath is still happening all the time,
Practice is that you are indomitable,
That even at the times when you feel your weakest,
You may find the ability to fight your hardest.
Mahatma Gandhi once said that strength is not determined by physical capacity,
It is determined by indomitable will.
So no matter what your life circumstances are in this moment,
Deep within you is something that is unbreakable,
And you tap into it through the sound of your own breathing.
If you haven't already done so,
Release the Ujjayi breathing,
Relax your throat completely,
Return your breath to easy breaths in through your nose and out through your nose.
Behind your breathing,
Beneath and around is the rhythm of your heartbeat,
The rhythm of your pulse.
Tune into that steady beat.
The magic of this pulse.
Find this rhythm again,
And again.
An unbroken chain.
If it serves you now,
Begin to bring your hands together,
Palm to palm,
Interlacing your fingers,
Including your thumbs.
Then extending your index fingers forward,
Creating Kali Mudra.
Your shoulders can relax,
Your elbows loose at your sides,
Your index fingers pointing straight out from your heart.
Find again your breath.
Move the Mudra forward,
Letting your elbows lengthen away from your body,
Your arms extending straight before you,
The Mudra strong and pointed out from your heart.
Your fingers before you like a sword,
About to slice through whatever feels insurmountable.
On your inhale,
The Mudra rises overhead,
And on your exhale,
You let it slice through the air towards the earth.
Breathing in,
The Mudra rising overhead.
Breathing out,
Sliced towards the earth.
Taking the Mudra overhead one last time,
Inhaling fully.
Breathing out,
Sliced to the earth.
Letting your hands re-relax to rest wherever they're most comfortable.
Loosening your jaw,
Settling your shoulders.
Finding your way back to the steady pulse within you.
We'll move our way into a silent practice.
And before we do,
The words of e-viewing her poem,
Affirmation to Youth Living in Prison After Asatya Shakur.
Speak this to yourself until you know it is true.
I believe that I woke up today and my lungs were working miraculously.
My voice can sing and murmur and ask miraculously.
My hands may shake,
But they can hold me or another.
My blood still carries the gifts of the air from my heart to my brain,
Miraculously.
Put a finger to my wrist or my temple and feel it.
I am magic,
Life and all its good and bad and ugly things,
Scary things which I would like to forget,
Beautiful things which I would like to remember.
The whole messy,
Lovely,
True story of myself pulses within me.
I believe that the sun shines,
If not here,
Then somewhere.
Somewhere it rains and things will grow green and wonderful.
Somewhere inside me too it rains and things will grow green and wonderful.
Sometimes my insides rain from the inside out and then I know I am alive.
I am alive.
I am alive.
Strength is not determined by physical capacity.
It is determined by indomitable will.
Strength is not determined by physical capacity.
It is determined by indomitable will.
Thank you for taking the time to practice today.
