Breathing With The Trees ~ Entering The Nondual Breath

Is it a coincidence that the Buddha became enlightened while sitting under a tree?

Trees are not just our fellow earthlings, they are also deeply connected to us in an ancient symbiosis of breath.

Here you are invited on a brief visualization meditation, where we connect with this natural nonduality of our breathing. We recognize that our in-breath is the outbreath of plants, trees... in a way, of the world itself, and our inner Wind becomes the outer.

Listening to calming forest sounds, we can relax into connectedness and wholeness, and feel the essence of belonging, inclusion, and being at home on this planet, where we are interwoven spiritually, mentally, and physiologically with the natural world around us.

Dedicated to our old friends, the Trees.

image: Ales Krivec
audio: BurghRecords

Transcript

So get comfortable in a position for a few minutes of meditation.

Have your spine straight and allow some slowing down even for a short meditation.

Connect with your breath.

Just see how your body is feeling and breathing right now without changing it.

And what I would like to offer you for this brief session is to connect to breathing in a special way,

In a certain specific way.

Preferably you are able to see a tree from where you are and if not you can imagine a tree.

And if you don't like that you can also do it without a tree,

But with the outer world itself.

So as you're slowing down and feeling your body relax wherever it can right now,

I'd like to invite you to imagine that when you inhale that's the exhalation of the trees,

That's the exhalation of the world into you.

And when you exhale you can see that as the world's inhalation,

It's the inhalation of the tree.

And as you relax more and more perhaps you notice your breathing becomes a little bit longer,

A little bit deeper.

You really have this sense of the breath flowing into you is the exhalation,

The exhale of the tree of the world,

Which it is.

And when you exhale you're giving breath back to the world.

You're having an interchange with the trees or a specific tree that you're seeing or imagining.

It's quite wonderful to realize that our exhalation,

This used up breath,

Is actually the life force of the tree.

We're really in symbiosis with the trees on this planet.

Of course there are also plants,

Other types of plants.

I just like the image of the tree specifically.

And so this way of breathing is a way of connecting to that symbiosis,

This non-dual togetherness with the plants on this planet.

We typically,

I'm assuming anyway,

Speaking for myself,

But we typically don't really identify with the plants on this planet as part of our interbeing.

Of course on a conceptual level yes,

But typically when you hear people speak about interbeing it's about mostly other humans or other mammals.

But isn't it cool to also see,

Wow,

This breath that I give is actually the life for the plants,

For the trees,

For the planet.

And it goes even farther I would say than interconnection.

It's just we're part of the same fabric of this planet and our breath is a gift from the trees that we give right back in the way that they most enjoy it.

So stay here for a bit in silence breathing like this for about half a minute more.

Reviews

Perfect meditation after my Celtic tree oracle reading. Thank you 🙏

I had a favorite tree growing up in my backyard. She was lower to the ground and her branches would reach close to the ground making a natural fort for me to play in. I imagined myself laying under her branches and breathing in concert together. What a wonderful feeling to connect again with my favorite tree. Thank you for this moment

Really beautiful and relaxing, thank you! 🙏🏼🌳😍👌

I liked it very much and will recommend it to others. Thank you very much. I love trees and live With lots of them

Wonderful words stating the synergy of the giving and taking of breath between our bodies and the natural world ❤️🙏🪷

Love how connected we are to the natural world! Yes. It is so cool.

This was fascinating! Thank you so much! I knew about the trees and the oxygen, but I’m usually not aware of it every day so I’m going to make myself more consciously aware as I’m walking around and breathing and that’ll help me feel much more connected to nature at all times 🙏🙏🙏💚💚💚🥰🥰🥰

To me trees are the lungs of the earth.
This was a wonderful little session.
Thank you. 🙏

Always felt an affinity to the trees in my life. Having listened to your track, I feel even more connected to them and will add this to my meditative practice , especially when I next breathe next to my favourite tree! Thank you so much 🙏 🌲🙏

The most wonderful,powerful, truly life changing breath work exercise. Thank you🙏