Mindful Awareness

This is a live recording of a meditation Rachel uses in her local, addiction recovery class. This meditation is used to assist bringing mindful awareness to the mind and body and embracing a sense of personal forgiveness and inner harmony. Rachel uses a body scan to bring awareness to each bodily sensation, inviting us to call on the physical space in which we reside, to take some of the tension we may be internalising. Note: as this is a live recording, there is minor muffled background noise.

Transcript

Welcome to this trauma sensitive meditation.

Remembering that there is no destination we are trying to reach.

No particular state we are trying to invoke.

We just want to hold a sense of curious awareness around ourselves and the environment we find ourselves in.

Sometimes we might fall asleep when we meditate.

Or other times we may remain painfully awake and aware.

Hyper vigilant of every sensation within our body.

Sometimes you might want to relax but find your mind becoming busy and your body increasingly filled with tension.

And that's okay.

There is no right or wrong.

This is all just information for you to use and reflect upon.

Remember if you feel like you start to drift off too quickly and become too relaxed and that doesn't feel right for your body.

Feel yourself coming back to the chair,

The floor or your bed beneath yourself.

Feel yourself being supported by the floor,

The chair or your bed.

Feel yourself coming back to your body.

Run your thumb tips across your fingertips and come back into your body.

If you don't resonate with anything that I say today.

If something doesn't feel right for you to do then don't follow with your body or your mind.

Just listen with your ears.

And if it doesn't feel comfortable to keep your eyes closed then you might like to open your eyes during this meditation.

Whatever feels most comfortable for you.

So just allowing yourself to arrive in whatever space you find yourself.

Allowing your mind to arrive and allowing your body to arrive.

So often our body arrives somewhere but our mind is still thinking about what happened this morning or over lunch or something yesterday or years ago.

Or it might be projecting into the future.

Allow your mind and your body to arrive here all now at once.

Start to become aware of the points of contact your body is making with the floor,

The chair or the bed.

Becoming aware of which parts of your body feel the heaviest.

And allow the surface that you're resting upon to really hold you.

Have a sense of the floor,

The chair or the bed really coming up to hold you.

So often we'll sit down in a chair or we'll lay down in our beds and we'll still be bracing,

We'll still be tensing and holding.

Supporting ourself.

See if you can let the floor,

The chair or the bed take some of that weight for you.

See if you can just let go one or two percent more.

Start to become aware of your posture,

The shape of your spine and the quality of energy that that brings to you.

There's no right or wrong.

There's no good or bad.

Just noticing.

Sometimes it feels strong and powerful to have an upright spine.

To feel the energy flowing through our body.

And sometimes it can feel more comforting for us to curl up and to go inwards.

Becoming aware of the air upon your skin or maybe the clothing upon your skin.

It's okay if you can't feel the air or the clothing upon your skin,

But just be curious.

See what you can notice.

Noticing the temperature of your body.

Are you feeling hot,

Cold or somewhere in between?

Start to notice which places in your body feel the warmest and which places in your body feel the coolest.

Just noticing that there's several temperature zones going on in your body at the one time.

Noticing what noises you can hear.

Start by close by.

Maybe you can hear the sound of your own breath.

Your heart beating.

Your tummy gurgling.

Often if our tummy gurgles,

This is a good sign.

It means that we feel relaxed enough for our rest and digest system to come online.

Maybe you can hear a clock ticking.

The creeks and cracks of the building you find yourself in.

If you expand your hearing awareness out a little further.

You may be able to hear the leaves rustling.

Birds chirping.

Cars passing by.

Just becoming aware of sounds and the spaces in between the sounds.

Becoming aware of the soundscape you find yourself within.

Noticing if your body needs to make any movements to feel even just one or two percent more comfortable.

Maybe you might just need to wiggle a little finger or toe.

Maybe you might need to scratch an itch.

Or just wriggle your whole body around.

Making any movements you need to make to allow yourself to feel as comfortable as possible.

Noticing how it feels to honour the body and to listen to what it needs.

So often in the western world we override.

Our body is always trying to talk to us.

Always listening.

So just allowing yourself to come into a space of curiosity and awareness.

Of what your body wants to tell you today.

Start to become aware of how you're energetically feeling.

Are you feeling anxious and tense?

If so,

See if you can allow yourself to soften a little.

See if you can allow yourself to create a little bit more space and softness within yourself.

See if you can open up a little.

And if you're feeling the opposite,

If you're already feeling far too open,

Uncontained,

As though your energy is all over the place today.

See if you can draw that energy in towards yourself.

Imagine you could pull that energy in towards yourself and make a container for yourself.

You might like to bring in the support of the floor or the chair to help you build this containment for yourself.

So just noticing what you need today.

Do you need to soften and open?

Or do you need to draw in and contain?

Just noticing what your energy needs today.

It's now time to slow down.

To be intentional.

To notice the energy that you're bringing into this space and into this moment.

I invite you to take a deep breath all the way in and forcefully sigh it out.

Imagine breathing in new,

Fresh,

Rejuvenating air.

Breathing out any old,

Stale air and energy that may be trapped inside of the lungs and the body.

Imagine your breath could fill you up with whatever it is that you need right now.

Imagine all the interactions that you've had this week.

The people that you've spoke with,

The work that you've done,

Maybe the bills that you've paid.

All that energy you've put out there into the universe.

What if you could scoop all that energy back up again and pour it back into yourself?

Let your inwards breath fill you up now with whatever you need and let your outwards breath make space for that.

Next,

If it feels okay,

I invite you to bring your breathing awareness to your nostrils.

Start to notice the breath flowing in and out of your nostrils.

Even if this is the millionth time that you've noticed the breath at your nostrils,

Can you notice the breath at your nostrils?

As though it was the first time you were ever really noticing the breath at your nostrils.

Like a curious scientist observing the breath flowing in and out of your nostrils.

If your nose is blocked,

You can just focus on the breath flowing in and out of your mouth.

You might notice which nostril is more blocked than another.

Be curious about the sensations.

Notice how the air enters cooler on the way in and warmer on the way out.

What happens to your breath when you notice it at the nostrils?

Does it slow down?

Does it quicken?

Maybe it just stays the same.

Just noticing the breath at the nostrils.

When we focus all of our attention and curiosity on the breath,

It becomes more difficult for us to get caught up in our thoughts.

Maybe you don't even like noticing the breath at the nostrils.

Just becoming aware of that too.

And then dropping your breathing awareness next down to your belly.

Can you allow your belly to rise and fall with the breath?

Inhalation belly rises,

Exhalation belly falls.

Inhalation belly rises,

Exhalation belly falls.

We hold a lot of pain,

Tension,

Grief,

Anxiety in our belly.

A lot of protection in our belly.

A lot of tightness in our belly.

See if you can let some of that protection,

That armoring,

That tightness go.

Allow your breath to be soft in soft belly.

Breathing down into the belly.

When we breathe down into our bellies we begin to slow down our nervous system.

We send a message to our brain that says we're safe,

Everything's okay here.

And you don't have to change the rate or rhythm of your breathing.

But if you're feeling curious you may like to try breathing out longer than you breathe in.

When you breathe out longer than you breathe in you can slow down your nervous system even further.

You get to take control of your nervous system back rather than your nervous system controlling you.

Just breathing down into that soft belly.

Inhalation belly rises,

Exhalation belly falls.

And if you wish to take it even further I invite you to place your hands upon your belly.

Or one hand on your belly and one hand on your chest.

This is a self soothing gesture that can help to keep your energy feeling really safe and contained.

If you breathe down into your belly while holding your belly or holding your belly and chest before bed this can aid in sleep.

If your mind is feeling really really busy you may like to also incorporate for yourself a small mantra.

On the inwards breath you might like to silently say to yourself let and on the outwards breath you might like to silently say to yourself go.

Inwards breath let,

Outwards breath go.

Inwards breath let,

Outwards breath go.

I invite you to continuously keep focusing on bringing your awareness back to your breath,

Breathing into your belly,

Your nostrils or your mantra.

Each time your mind begins to wander off.

The purpose of meditation though is not to clear your mind of all thoughts.

We can't do that and we have a brain and it's its job to think.

However we want to watch out for when we get hooked into unhelpful thoughts.

The thoughts about what I could have done or what I should have done or what I will do and stories about those stories and stories about those stories.

All about things that haven't even happened yet.

Notice when your mind starts to wander down this path and then just gently bring it back to the breath at your nostrils,

Your belly or your mantra.

The mind has approximately 80,

000 thoughts a day.

80% of these have been found to be unhelpful.

They're not bad,

They're not wrong,

They're just unhelpful.

So just looking out for those unhelpful thoughts and when we begin we begin to hook and fuse into those unhelpful thoughts.

The untrained mind is like an untrained puppy dog.

Easily distracted wandering off time and time again.

If you have a puppy dog and you leave it alone in a room,

What's it going to do?

It's going to get really destructive.

It's going to wee on the floor,

It's going to rip up the couch,

Eat up your shoes,

Go through the bin.

This is like our unwatched mind.

Our unwatched mind also wanders off and becomes quite destructive as well.

But in time with a puppy dog,

If you teach it to come back and to sit and to stay,

It eventually will and you won't have to train it anymore.

That's like our mind.

If we start to pay attention to what we're thinking and to redirect it back to sit and to stay,

It won't wander off into those unhelpful places as much anymore.

Next I invite you to imagine you have a ball of light at the top of your head.

A shining golden white ball of light at the top of your head.

Now I want you to imagine this golden white ball of light rolling down the front of your body.

All the way down,

Underneath your feet and back up the back of your body until it reaches your head once again.

Then allowing that golden white ball of light to roll down the right side of your body.

All the way down,

Underneath your feet and back up the left side of your body until it reaches your head once again.

You have now woven yourself a protective cocoon of light.

Your cocoon of light will hold space for safety,

Wellness,

Restoration,

Reflection and maybe even relaxation to take place.

This golden white light is a healing white light.

You can draw upon it anytime you need.

It never runs out.

You can take as much as you like,

Anytime you like.

Feel that healing golden white light filling up the space all around you.

Cleaning and cleansing the air and energy all around you.

Feel that golden white light energy washing all over your aura.

You may like to take in some of that white light energy into your body.

Imagine it entering through your heart,

Your breath,

Your third eye or the crown of your head.

Imagine breathing in that healing golden white light energy.

Let it fill you up from the tips of your toes to the top of your head.

Cleaning,

Clearing and cleansing every single pore,

Cell and fibre in your body.

Any stress,

Tension,

Anxiety,

Anger,

Frustration,

Anything that's not serving you in this moment.

Imagine it just dripping out of your fingers and toes and it just gets sucked away out of your cocoon.

Leaving you with nothing but this beautiful golden healing white light energy.

Filling you up from the tips of your toes to the top of your head.

Next we're going to do a body scan.

When I say a part of the body I invite you to intentionally relax that part.

When I say that part of the body again I want you to relax it even further.

If you can't feel a part of your body know that that's okay and you can just place your intention or your attention there.

Or you might like to give those places in your body a little squeeze and flex just so you have the sensation of holding and letting go.

If it doesn't feel right for you to relax your body you don't have to relax your body.

You may just like to place your awareness on those body parts.

If you've been doing this for a little while you may like to take it further and notice where else you hold things in your body like emotions and other sensations.

Toes relax.

Toes relax.

Feet and heels relax.

Feet and heels relax.

Relax your ankles.

Ankles relax.

Calves relax.

Relax your shins.

Shins relax.

Knees relax.

Knees relax.

Relax your thighs.

Thighs relax.

Buttocks relax.

Buttocks relax.

Relax your pelvis.

Pelvis relax.

Hips relax.

Hips relax.

Lower back relax.

Lower back relax.

Upper back relax.

Upper back relax.

Allow all the tension to just unwind and melt away from your tummy.

Tummy relax.

Tummy relax.

Allow the air to flow freely into your lungs and notice the space that this creates in between each and every rib bone.

Chest relax.

Chest relax.

Allow your shoulders to fall away from your ears a little.

Shoulders relax.

Shoulders relax.

Upper arms relax.

Upper arms relax.

Forearms relax.

Forearms relax.

Relax your hands.

Hands relax.

Fingers and fingernails relax.

Fingers and fingernails relax.

Moving back up to the shoulders and neck once again.

Shoulders and neck relax.

Shoulders and neck relax.

Letting all the tension just melt away from your jaw.

Jaw relax.

Jaw relax.

Relax your cheeks.

Cheeks relax.

Mouth and tongue relax.

Mouth and tongue relax.

Relax your lips.

Lips relax.

Nose relax.

Nose relax.

Eyes and eyelids relax.

Eyes and eyelids relax.

Unfurrow your brow and allow your forehead to relax.

Forehead relax.

Relax your ears.

Ears relax.

Skelp relax.

Skelp relax.

Hair relax.

Hair relax.

Whole body relax.

Whole body relax.

Noticing where your body has already tried to take up tension again.

And just invite those areas to relax once again.

Whole body relax.

Just letting your mind melt into your body and allowing your body to melt into the surface that it's resting upon.

Whole body relax.

Your body and mind healing and replenishing.

Reviews

No silence

Very effective - thanks!

I loved it! It did end suddenly tho...

I lost myself a couple of times in this meditation.🙂

Really relaxing thank you