Today,
I would like to guide you through a basic focused attention meditation.
I invite you to take a position on your chair that is relaxed and alert at the same time.
You might want to sit at the front of your chair,
Having a straight spine,
Keeping your head up high and not leaning too much back into the rest of your chair.
You might want to put your feet firmly on the ground and connect to the ground through your feet.
You may put your hands on your thighs or on your lap.
I invite you to close your eyes or to keep them slightly open with a soft focus in front of you.
We start by taking a deep breath in,
Followed by a long breath out.
Continue to breathe in our own rhythm,
Connecting to the anchor point where we can feel the breathing most vividly.
It might be your abdomen,
Which is moving up and down as you are breathing in and out.
It might be in your chest,
Your throat or the tip of your nostrils where the cooler air is flowing in and the slightly warmer air is flowing out.
Connect to this anchor point where you can feel it most vividly and follow a full cycle of breathing,
Connecting especially to the breaks in between inhaling and exhaling,
Where your lung is fully loaded with air before you start exhaling or where your lung is fully empty before starting to inhale again.
If your attention starts to float away and you notice that thoughts,
Emotions or sensations of your body are interfering,
Just notice them with curiosity and kindness and bring your attention back to your anchor point where you can feel your breathing again and stay there with your attention,
Breathing in and breathing out.
You may also want to count on the exhale up from one,
One,
Two,
Silently in your head and see how far you get.
If you notice that you don't know the next number anymore because your attention has wandered,
Just notice it with curiosity and kindness and start all over again from one.
Nowhere to go,
Nothing to do.
Breathing in and breathing out,
Allowing your mind to rest.
We close this exercise by taking another deep breath in followed by a long breath out.
And when we are ready,
We may open our eyes again and bring our attention back to the room in which we are sitting right now.
Thank you.
