North Star: Into The Body, Into Aliveness, & Into Life's Calling

Landing into the earthiness of our body. Staying lower down and further back in our bodies can help stay under the radar of distraction and alarm. Let there be a thread of connection, already here, now.

In tune with life beyond biology, feel easefully what’s important. How is life calling you? If you could, you would. A north star, a subtle magnetism. Letting this inquiry happen as an easeful dawning, a natural devotion.

Jaya recorded this meditation live during quarantine in 2020.

Transcript

Please be comfortable if possible.

Perhaps a possibility of somewhere being at ease even if there's a lot going on,

Or even if there's a feeling of not enough going on,

Or whatever may be the case.

Perhaps somewhere at ease with how things are,

How the inner landscape and outer landscape are happening today.

Perhaps partly by acknowledging that it's not up to us to design and create everything with our hands.

So there's a lot not in our control,

And also that we have influence.

So sometimes we might say,

Oh my flowers are doing well.

And what we mean by my flowers is that we've maybe given some food and water and a good spot out of the wind to those flowers.

And we've enjoyed how they grow.

So maybe similarly with our inner and outer lives,

The sense of it being my life can be where I care enough to give nourishment,

Juiciness,

Some shelter,

Some fresh air,

And to leave it all alone enough that it can grow and we can enjoy the growing.

And maybe as we're settling in today,

If you wish to consider if there's some area in your life of growth,

Growth sometimes can be a really weird,

Funny experience.

We think of for a plant that was just growing up straight after growing down,

And then it starts to branch or it starts to bud,

Something different is happening.

So if we could feel where we might be branching or budding or searching the earth for nourishment and juice in our roots.

Somewhere where there might be a movement or a change of shape that could feel surprising or uncomfortable even.

Or to have a little space where if something does feel kind of yucky in your life,

Maybe it's part of transformation and we could kind of erase or delete the assumption that something's wrong.

Just because it feels uncomfortable doesn't mean necessarily that there's something wrong.

So the possibility of ease in our ordinary lives,

Just as we are,

Maybe resting back or into the ground and maybe feeling your backbone or the area around and within your backbone.

That's especially the lower back for a while,

If you like.

Okay.

Leaving room in the area of your lower back for a breathing.

The possibility of enough space for that whole apparatus of bones and space between bones.

Nails and muscles and connective tissue.

And thank goodness there's also skin.

All of that having its harmony.

What kinds of cells living together.

The possibility of playing with the contrast of allowing the back to be heavy.

And also that heaviness is not absolute,

That maybe along with heaviness there's some openness or a sense more of space than something solid sometimes.

Just allowing heaviness and lift or three-dimensionality,

Volume.

And maybe some movements happening by themselves and felt by itself.

Okay.

And as you maybe start to arrive or get the feeling of settling a little bit,

Maybe not worrying too much about the places that are full of energy or tight or busy,

Letting them be,

And still maybe sinking a little further into the ground or into your back.

Not pressuring your back but relaxing into an elastic,

Supportive,

Firm kind of feeling of back and ground.

Perhaps allowing a new alignment in the body to start to float into place or shift into place.

Where maybe the front brain and face can kind of drain a bit their importance.

The front upper body could also,

It could turn the volume down a little bit.

At least turning the volume down on our listening to what's happening in the places of tension.

Letting them be a little bit like turning the lights out to let the children find their way to sleep even if they're not sleepy yet.

Let's see what happens today.

If we just let things be and turn the volume down on our attention to the upper and front body thinking and emotion and story.

And just landing into the earth,

Into the earthiness of our body,

The heaviness,

Aliveness,

The breathing.

Perhaps especially around the lower back if you like.

And the abdomen behind the pelvis.

Or if that area feels like it has too much sensitivity for any reason then the legs or the feet or the whole back of the body can be good.

Or perhaps rather a sense of the space around the body including the body can also be good.

Or just finding your way,

What matches for you for today.

Simple movements,

Warmth,

Heaviness,

Hereness of body as a practice,

Landing in there over and over again.

Gradually we could invite ourselves to be.

More in a mode of staying more continuously in the sort of lower mind we could say that's already in touch with the body non-verbally.

So without inviting thinking,

Immersing in an area of your body.

Perhaps the lower back,

Perhaps the feet or the whole body.

And almost like we're beginning to discover that we could go underwater so to speak and stay safely underwater without coming up to think about or imagine what we're experiencing.

Just staying continuously at ease immersed in the ongoing kind of flow of sensations.

Letting it feel itself if possible.

Noticing the kind of interference of our thinking,

Imagining mind,

Bringing in an imagined version of what we're feeling.

No problem,

Just noticing the difference between imagination and feeling.

And noticing the difference when we're more at ease,

How the feeling flow silently goes along.

How it maybe can be a bit more vivid or intense as well as delicious compared to when there's more tension in our trying.

And so playing maybe with trying less in a way that helps us slide into an axis of our here-ness.

Already here-ness.

Already now-ness.

We're born with it,

Born into it.

And we're allowed in this already here-ness,

Already now-ness,

To include a kind of fragrance of something timeless,

Something beyond time and space in this very here and now.

And here.

And the possibility of staying just with this practice for the rest of the session.

Letting the body be heavy as well as have its volume or lightness or openness and movements.

Immersing in an area of the body or into soundscape and hearing if body is impossible or very difficult for you,

No problem.

And connecting a bit more towards continuously,

A little thread of connection with already here and already now,

Cells feeling themselves alive and also filled from within with life beyond biology.

Or if you feel like the immersion in this area of your body lends itself with the body would lead naturally to start to feel and honor what you love about presence,

About being alive,

About a living quality in this ordinary life.

What you find most important or what you find most precious or most needed for a sense of really responding to your life's calling in this lifetime while we can.

If it's possible staying at ease or towards ease of letting this happen as a natural kind of easeful dawning,

Awakening,

A kind of a natural devotion in each human being.

When we're unoccupied there could be this fresh turning towards what's important,

Willingness to follow through on what's important,

To live what's important,

What's precious,

What's juicy.

First of all,

If possible staying more at ease and letting yourself find your way with these words that I'm sharing around feeling easefully what's important.

What is it like to leave room and to trust the intelligence of your deeper inner life?

That when we're less occupied there could be a movement almost like a movement in sleep,

The body simply shifting to be more comfortable,

Something deep within us that would turn towards responding to our calling.

Let's continue.

.

And there may or may not be a name or words or image for what's important and precious and juicy in your life.

For what's meaningful or what's your North Star.

A subtle magnetism.

If you could,

You would let yourself be pulled or attracted that way.

There may or may not be words yet for what's pulling and what that feeling of responding to what's pulling,

Responding to the North Star.

It may not have a name but perhaps there's a feeling in the body.

That you could allow to fill all the cells of your body.

And this is where we could start to bring in some imagination on purpose.

If possible in a way that is more of a happening than a doing.

Your natural kind of inner language happening.

If you could,

You would let yourself feel that that's powerful,

Important,

Delicious.

And it feels like what and where in your body or in subtle sensations.

And if it's helpful to have words or images or both,

Like peace or spaciousness,

Freedom.

In your own language,

Your native tongue and your really inner native language.

Imagine if a child like innocence,

If no one were watching,

If you don't have to say it out loud,

That secret innermost pull or love or knowing.

That sweetness,

Silkiness,

Fluidity or stillness,

That mountain,

That breeze,

That honey.

That sprouting or growing flower or fruit,

Whatever it may be for you.

And sometimes finding words or images that are good enough to help you resonate with this sense of what's precious in your lifetime can be helpful,

Can help us stay more easily with this kind of crest of a wave of what we're just beginning to learn or that part of the trail we're just beginning to walk.

To feel more allowed inwardly.

To feel the yes.

May I live at ease.

Or may there be ease.

Or just a word like ease as one example.

As easefully as possible.

More towards letting it happen.

If you feel you're getting in a hurry,

Then just coming maybe back to the body on the ground,

Heavy and with its volume and movements and openness and mystery.

Quieting back down,

More into receiving what is.

And sometimes,

Some days,

There might be a sense of just receiving what is starts to include a receiving of an inner calling.

And we can practice rolling from that receiving just the sensations of the body and the mystery of the body and the contrasts in our body of heavy and light,

For example.

To also including some kind of inner gravity that's already maybe in there that we're just becoming conscious of,

Just acknowledging and feeling that we dare to listen and follow that calling.

Perhaps without a grand vision or plan,

Just feeling our way along.

And when it's sometimes easier to feel,

Allowing the feeling of each cell,

Each corner of your being with that sensual texture or flavor or music.

Perhaps on the in-breath,

Connecting with the texture,

The fluidity,

The breeze,

The air,

Whatever it may be.

On the in-breath and perhaps filling your whole being with the out-breath,

With that silkiness or mountain quality.

Feeling the quality as you breathe in,

Letting it be really vivid and real for you.

Ordinary and pure,

Nothing special and also it's everything.

Even with the out-breath,

A sense of filling your body and being,

If you wish.

With permission of each area,

With permission of each cell,

Each pocket of your being,

Not an invasion.

Just a pouring through and around.

And perhaps after a while,

A sense of overflowing in all directions,

As if through your skin.

The sense,

Texture,

With or without a name or image,

Filling and overflowing with the out-breath.

The possibility that overflowing could go everywhere.

Could fill and saturate cushions,

Floor,

Air,

Walls.

Could offer itself to creatures near you and could pass over the face of the earth,

Through the earth,

Through the sky,

Like a fragrance or a song or like sunshine.

May there be peace and joy and fulfillment on earth today.

May all beings live at ease,

Learning to listen to their innermost calling towards awakening for all.

Reviews

So very helpful to tune into all this weight and weightlessness and gravitational pulls towards what'what's important. Thank you.

What a gift, thank you. Will be listening to this one regularly.❤️🙏🏼💕

Thank you Jaya!!