Welcome to today's meditation.
This is a meditation that's all about women,
Our women,
Us as women,
The women who brought us into this world.
Coming into a seated position,
You can find a place on the floor with a cushion underneath you,
Allowing you to sit straight so your spine is tall,
Shoulders relaxed,
Chin drops slightly,
Throat back.
You can also find this posture in a chair with a straight back if that's more comfortable for you.
We begin by closing our eyes and then taking a long exhale out through the mouth and then starting to bring awareness to your breath.
No need to push the breath in any specific direction,
No need to stress about the breath.
Let your natural breath come.
Just bringing a mindful eye to your breath.
How does it feel on an inhale through the nose?
You feel the belly expand slightly,
Filling the chest with air.
You feel the brush of air against the nostrils.
On an exhale,
Feeling that slight constriction in the back of the throat when you close your mouth and breathe out through the nose.
Perhaps you feel the belly contract slightly.
Perhaps you feel that relaxation that your body is welcoming as you take a mindful exhale.
On an inhale,
Again feeling the belly fill,
Lower upper abdomen,
Chest cavity fill with air.
Feeling that heart center expanding as you take in more oxygen.
By bringing one hand to our belly and one hand to our heart,
We can start to feel that motion of the breath filling us completely on every inhale,
Allowing us to feel that relaxing exhale,
Seeing how we feel in this moment by just bringing a little bit of mindfulness to this thing that we do all the time.
Bringing it back to the breath.
Ask yourself,
Can you be still,
Perfectly still for the next few breaths?
Try to not move a muscle in the body,
Allowing the breath to be the only guide and you simply follow this gesture of stepping back from all of our impulse and our very strong reaction that we can have to thought to sensation in the body.
It can be in control quite often.
So I invite you in this singular moment to let go of that response and drop down into being.
That floating in between,
Allowing the suspension of breath at the top of an inhale and the bottom of an exhale be your invitation to deepen your meditation,
To allow those few seconds of stillness to allow it to hold you,
Knowing that in this moment you are being breathed as you breathe,
You are being held.
Think of the support beneath you.
Think of the clean air around you.
Maybe take a moment to acknowledge the space that you've stepped into to begin this meditation.
Maybe it's a space you've created,
You've mindfully pieced together this place of retreat.
Perhaps you're sitting in the middle of your life,
The messes,
The papers,
The work.
Perhaps you find yourself amidst all the things that demand and command your attention.
No matter where you find yourself,
Just take a second to acknowledge that you are still able to find stillness amidst this space,
Whether it's catered to quietness or not.
You've chosen to step away from the push and pull of all of the tasks and demands that are put on you as a woman.
Now with our eyes closed,
I want you to bring a special awareness to the third eye,
The space between the eyebrows.
For some people,
This is comfortable to bring your inner gaze,
Your drishti to the center focal point.
Your eyes will be looking slightly up.
If that's not comfortable,
You can just relax your eyes behind your eyelids.
Bringing your hands down to your knees,
Palms facing up.
For this meditation,
I want you to bring an intention into your space,
Into your breath.
This intention could be as simple as gratitude for this moment that you've given yourself.
Perhaps it's gratitude for a woman in your life,
A feminine figure who's shown up and continues to advocate for you.
Perhaps this is your own mother,
Your own life giver.
Maybe it's your daughter,
Your son,
Those humans that you've brought into this world with force and love and that you've held for so long.
Maybe you hold them differently today than you did yesterday,
But your role as mother is forever.
When we cultivate an intention,
We don't always have to think so much,
But instead try to feel into what calls you today and try to observe that feeling tone and bring that into today's sit.
When we put focus on something,
We give it life.
We give it recognition.
We allow it to become a part of us so when it becomes a positive and mindful and carefully felt intention of focus,
Then we are allowing it to flourish.
So whether that is gratitude,
Whether that is presence,
Or whether that is maybe a wish,
A small hope that is something you maybe need some support with.
Maybe you're asking for something today.
That simple act of bringing it into your space gives it life.
Let it lead this practice.
Welcome it in.
Drawing a long inhale through the nose,
I want you to imagine this next breath as filling you up completely,
Filling up this space,
This conscious space that we feel is our human body.
Filling up the space around the human body in form.
Maybe imagining the whole room bubbling with this breath.
Imagine the edges of your body begin to become formless so you are not just this human body,
You are the whole room you are in.
You are the whole natural space maybe you find yourself in.
As we move through these very conscious inhales and exhales,
I want you to see if you can keep the same length for an inhale as you do an exhale.
Often times we can revert to counting to help us keep track.
Starting with three seconds is always a good beginning.
So on an inhale together we will breathe in through the nose for one,
Two,
Three,
Pausing for just a moment at the top of the breath.
Exhale three,
Two,
One,
Pausing at the bottom of the breath.
Inhale for one,
Two,
Three,
Pause,
Three,
Two,
One,
Pause.
Continue this breath cycle on your own.
We come to meditation to observe.
It's not a renouncement of the world around us but rather full acceptance of the world around us as well as the world within us.
We come to sit to observe the fullness of our own breath,
The fullness of our own form and our souls.
How no matter where we are in our journey,
No matter where we are truly,
No matter where we are,
We are already full.
We are already complete.
I think of the moon cycles that happen,
The cycle of full moon,
Of crescent moon,
The waxing and the waning and this reveal of the moon that we get to witness every single night.
Sometimes maybe we'll celebrate the full moon when it's at its brightest but we don't always acknowledge the moon when it's just a sliver in the sky.
My mom always taught me to look up at the moon when I'm missing her or needing to feel that motherly connection from wherever I am in the world and often she refers to that sliver of a moon as just a little thumbnail,
That tiny piercing of light that's just the edge of a thumbnail,
Nothing more,
Nothing less.
And as I observed this in the jungle recently in my outpost in Costa Rica,
I realized that that same sliver of moon is really the full moon.
She was never just a sliver.
She was always full.
Now I breathe into that space of knowing that she was always full.
It's a matter of what was revealed,
What light was being shown on her to showcase her fullness.
I think of the women who have come before me and their journey to fullness,
Their journey to reveal themselves as honestly,
As creatively,
As uniquely as they possibly could and I channel them here in this space for this meditation.
I honor the women who have chosen to be mothers.
I honor the women who have chosen to not be mothers but still be deeply motherly,
Deeply available and loving and a guide for so many.
I honor the women who cannot have children.
I honor the women who are yearning for children.
I honor the women,
Our women,
Us as women.
I choose to see their fullness no matter where they are on their journey,
No matter what struggles they sit with,
No matter what lines frown their forehead,
No matter what crows feet dance along the edges of their eyes,
No matter the suppleness of their cheeks,
Their chest and their shoulders,
No matter the freckles,
No matter the sunspots,
No matter the wispy greys coming in through the crown,
The baby soft feather hairs around their crown.
I honor them both.
I honor them as the same.
We were always full.
In this moment,
I want you to see if you can relax the body just a little more.
See if you can relax the skin around your face.
See if you can relax the shoulders,
The belly,
The feet,
The hands.
Recognizing that even as a mother who is asked to be strong,
Who is asked to stand up,
To be the healer,
To be the shoulder,
To be the body,
The heart,
The wisdom that so many of us ask of you,
That right now you are being held.
Right now,
You don't have to hold the world so high up.
I invite you to soften,
Keeping those long and deep inhales and exhales as your guiding focus,
Letting the breath bind you to this very moment.
Thank you.
Drawing a long inhale through the nose.
Exhale through the mouth.
Take a few more breaths just like that,
Feeling that flow of breath washing through you,
And then coming back to your normal breathing.
Bringing one hand to your low belly and one hand to your heart,
Keeping the eyes closed,
We bow our heads slightly forward,
Maybe keeping that gaze inward up at the third eye,
Acknowledging our inner wisdom,
Our insight,
Our knowing that goes beyond seeing,
Feeling that life force moving through you,
Within you,
Around you,
Bringing your intention into your space,
Maybe whispering the intention out loud,
Maybe saying the word that came to mind a few times over,
Bowing towards the intention,
Allowing it to already be,
To have already begun to the mothers for holding us,
Healing us,
Then letting us run,
For watching and sharing and seeing us soar,
For letting our messes be lessons,
For letting us fall,
Hit the bottom,
Harden then soften all over again,
For teaching us love without condition so that one day we can love just as hard as you,
To the mothers who show us that breaking doesn't mean we're broken,
For revealing that language that lives beneath the grief,
And that healing from heartbreak is another type of birth,
And maybe we'll be willing and able to have many births in just this one life,
To the mothers who amplify our voices when the world stops listening,
And teaching us that speaking our truth is not an option but a necessity,
To the mothers we are nothing without you and everything because of you.
I give my own gratitude to the women that have come before me,
The women in my family,
Mothers,
Aunts,
Grandmothers,
Sisters,
The women who are guides from afar,
Whose voices ring through me when I am too broken to hear my own.
I honor these women.
If you're receiving this meditation,
You are one of these women.
Gently floating our hands back down to our knees,
Palms open,
We receive the energy from above,
From around,
From within,
Saying thank you for this space,
Letting her be held,
Letting her be heard,
Bringing our palms together at our heart center.
With our heads slightly bowed forward,
We acknowledge the teacher and the guide within each of us,
That wise sage,
That woman who knows,
That woman who is always whole,
Gently flickering the eyes open.
Namaste.
Thank you.
Be at peace and be well.
