While getting comfortable,
Including the possibility of lying down.
I'd just like to bring up the subject of the just enough,
Just enough structure that helps you thrive.
Just enough form to your day and also in the meditation,
Feeling for what's just enough instruction for you.
That helps you get into your own flow.
And once you get into your own flow,
Then staying with that rather than hearing what my instructions are saying.
So while getting comfortable,
Maybe considering when was a time in your life that you were in a good flow.
You got a good momentum.
Whether towards physical health or meditation rhythm or in a relationship or at work.
In your garden or with a hobby,
You had a good flow,
A good rhythm,
Good momentum.
And maybe just remembering that time for a few moments as we get settled.
Feeling how it felt in your body as you remember,
Letting your body remember.
And then we can let it go for a while.
Drop the subject.
If you like.
Drop into your body maybe into the basin of the lower belly and back.
Feeling what you feel there.
Perhaps laying a hand on the lower belly or hip if you if you like if that's comfortable.
Or just considering and feeling where your hands would feel good.
Where would be comfortable for your hands to be?
Where would the hands feel at home?
Or in which placement of the hands does that help you feel more at home?
Perhaps holding a finger of the other hand.
Perhaps noticing if your hands,
If you feel better having your hands off your body if you're lying on your back for example.
Giving yourself a chance to feel if your palms are facing up.
How does that feel?
In the rest of your body.
And also how does that change the inner atmosphere?
And if you just gently turn the palms face down.
And give yourself a chance to feel.
So simply turning the palms face down if you're lying on your back or if you're sitting as well.
The ripples that come up the arms into the chest and upper back.
Maybe even up the throat and neck.
And giving a little bit more time a bit more of a pause.
To notice that even in this simple change of hand position.
May gradually bring a significant change in your atmosphere inside in your mind state.
And so again letting your hands and your body be free to place hands and body on the earth on the ground.
Perhaps with the feeling of a bird in a nest.
Or a leopard on a tree.
A cat in the sunshine.
A dog,
You know,
Curling up a few times and then settling.
Letting our animal body,
Our gentle vulnerable body,
Our powerful body be at home on the earth.
In the atmosphere of the mind.
In the care of our position under the influence of our posture.
Perhaps it's also interesting to notice the texture of what you're in touch with on the ground.
The texture of what supports you.
And just feeling the communication of skin and texture.
How much comes across if you're in touch with something quite solid or quite silky or fluffy.
Or if you're in touch with the actual earth.
Grass or sand or whatever.
Allowing your wide mind to be aware of the influence that the textures we're in touch with have on our minds.
That it makes a difference.
Subtle or obvious.
And we have the inbuilt capacity to feel and notice.
That influence that effect.
That communication.
Of the form,
The structure that we're in touch with.
The influence that it has on our inner life.
And resting back,
Maybe allowing an out breath or two to be a bit longer.
Or looser.
Or more at home.
Perhaps resting back,
Feeling your back.
Letting your back be alive or come alive.
The back as it is.
But allowed to be alive,
To be felt.
To have and loosen into more space,
A little bit more room.
Our backs allowed to carry a bit less.
And while resting back,
Perhaps just allowing another few out breaths.
As if the out breath is like a small waterfall pouring down the front of your body,
Pouring into your lap,
Pouring into the ground.
Or into your feet.
The back coming alive.
And the out breath pouring down.
If you're feeling a lot of energy,
Whether in habitual or pushy thinking or emotion or just a sense of a lot of intensity or energy that you're not even sure what it is,
Perhaps.
Then there's a possibility of including your feet,
Sensing your feet while also sensing your back.
The back like a sponge that was dry and is starting to fill with water and spread out,
Expand,
Come alive.
And then there's an out breath.
That's allowed to flow down into your legs.
Maybe even washing all the way to your feet.
Or into your lap.
A sense of feet,
A sense of back,
A sense of out breath for a little while.
If you like.
Or just connecting somewhere in your body if you prefer.
Or if sensing your body is super hard for you,
No problem.
There could just be sensing into what's important,
What you love in life.
But if possible,
Just really the simplicity of feet,
Back,
Out breath for a little while.
If you like.
If you find even now that you're actually not comfortable or well supported,
There's still time to give yourself that pause and readjustment.
And then sinking down into the ground,
Feeling your back.
The heels.
How would it be to try less hard to let your body feel itself?
To let the moment be now.
To let now be now and here be here.
You don't have to make it so it already is here and now.
How would it be to open out a little bit,
To ventilate a bit,
To give a little bit less attention to the out breath?
Or to rest so much into your back that you stop keeping track of it.
Feeling it but with less focus,
Less attention.
And there could be an opening out to include sound if there are sounds nearby.
Or just a sense perhaps of having less of a boundary,
Being less sure of where you end or begin.
As if the back coming alive,
Filling with life and perhaps getting longer and wider.
Spreading towards the horizon.
Or just open towards the horizon.
And some,
Maybe one third or so of your interest or attention with out breath and back.
If you like.
Being less busy,
If possible,
With trying to catch the moment,
The momentary sensations.
And even as there may be a feeling of allowing the body to be heavy and sink into the ground and spread out a bit and then open out a bit further.
Open to the sides.
Perhaps.
Or open all around.
Perhaps.
There could also be less interest in trying to get it right.
There could be less interest in cataloging each sensation,
And more allowing yourself to receive here and now the moment,
The momentary sensations and sounds.
And so as we might start to feel that we could be as big as the night sky.
There may also be a kind of gathering in towards the center.
A loose cloud or smudge of warmth or presence,
Here-ness.
And where in your body feels good to allow this gathering centering,
Receiving now and here.
You may continue with back feet out breath,
Or you may feel that recedes more and more into the background or this to the sides.
Or you could just be lower belly in the center.
Or where you feel good.
As a center or home.
In your cloud of experiences,
Sounds and sensations.
And as you are.
Resting back as if into a favorite place on earth.
And open to aliveness in your back.
As if you're floating in a sea or sky of here and now,
Of aliveness.
Or maybe you are the sea or sky of aliveness,
In which the sensations are happening.
That warmth or center of presence happening within that sea or sky of here and now,
Of aliveness,
Of coming alive.
Resting back and allowing.
The live here and now warmth,
Coolness,
Presence,
Okayness.
Allow to be that big and that here,
That warm,
That intimate,
That present.
Both.
And you enjoy being here,
Even though there's all that that goes on.
In our strange world,
Mysterious life.
Offering me.
All that Enemy.
If you wish,
Just resting,
Floating,
Receiving,
Sensing aliveness in this momentary sensation or sound and sense of presence with less trying,
Less imagination,
More directness and more receiving,
More relaxing,
Allowing more intensity sometimes,
More gentleness,
Allowing more directness sometimes.
Relaxing more,
We notice that here and now has an intensity,
Now is so tiny and electric and yet relaxing more.
We could continue practicing this way,
Experimenting this way or if you like,
I'd like to propose an option of just could you reach down into what feels like the deepest place,
The most intimate,
The source of your being or where that sense of am lives as if you could reach into the center of a tree with your hand,
Reaching into the center of your being with your intention or your love or your hereness if you like,
If that resonates with you as if you could reach a hand down or in to somewhere deeper than your name,
Deeper than your gender and just being in touch,
Being in contact as best we can there or rather here,
The here inside the here.
And resting,
Relaxing and getting a sense of yourself,
Your life,
Your lifetime and just hearing from yourself what you need if anything.
Not bringing up the subject of whether you can fulfill that need but just being in contact with is there a need,
Not a neediness,
Not a compulsive habit,
Not an addiction but some kind of life need and just staying in contact there and open to the possibility of the fulfillment of the need.
Perhaps we have within us what we need.
May our meditation and lives be devoted to what's precious and important in our lives towards what's possible in our lifetimes for the benefit of all including ourselves.
And I'd like to just bring up again the suggestion I made at the beginning in case we could find a way to feel and to remember,
To recover a sense of what is that simple and minimal structure.
So that might include schedule.
It might include different kinds of support.
It might include that much technique that helps you in your meditation,
That much schedule in your day that helps you get into your flow and feel your juiciness,
Your creative power and your ease.
So it could be partly by remembering a time that you had a good flow,
A good momentum and that momentum led to more momentum until maybe you got a little scared or life just came along and mixed it up,
Whatever happened.
And maybe saying it out loud,
Saying what if to someone that you trust and like or love,
Saying out loud,
I remember when going to sleep by 10 o'clock or whatever helped me get into a good rhythm.
You don't even have to say like I commit to it,
But I remember when it helped me.
What about you?
Something like that.
Thank you so much.
Wishing you much love and peace and ease in your lives.
