Welcome to your 10 minute Samatha meditation practice.
I will be keeping time so you'll hear a bell at the beginning and the end of our practice.
And let's begin by finding a comfortable seat.
So as you take your seat to practice,
Just take a moment to acknowledge the dignity and the compassion in taking these few moments in the midst of your life to just be with yourself,
To feel and allow things to be as they are.
If you're seated in a chair,
Let your feet be flat on the floor.
If you are on a meditation cushion or a bed or couch,
Just let your legs be loosely crossed in front of you.
And from the waist down,
Let the body feel heavy and rooted.
It's providing a strong foundation for your practice.
And from that strong foundation,
The upper half of the body can lift gently through a tall spine and elongated back of the neck.
And even up through the crown of the head.
And then from the front of the head,
Let your feet feel heavy and rooted.
And from the legs,
The hip flexors,
The hands or fingers,
The belly,
The chest,
The throat,
Or the facial muscles,
Just let that go.
Let go of what you don't need.
The eyes are open with a gentle downward gaze,
Letting in the full visual field without really staring at anything.
And the breath is natural and normal,
In and out through the nose.
And the object of our practice in shamatha is the sensation of breath.
So feel yourself breathing.
It's very different from counting breaths,
Following the breath,
Observing the breath,
Or feeling the breath.
So try to locate where in your body the feeling of breath is most prominent and let your mind's awareness rest there.
Feel the sensation of the full cycle of the breath as air enters through the nostrils and fills the lungs.
And then as breath dissolves back out into the space around you.
Let your mind be just as it is.
We're not trying to stop thinking.
We're learning to be with ourselves through all of our different states.
So however your mind feels this morning,
This afternoon,
This evening,
Just let it be while you continue to feel the breath.
And you'll notice that as you're feeling your breath,
You can remain awake and aware in your body and in your environment.
You don't need to shut anything out while you're training your awareness on the feeling of the breath.
And this includes your thoughts because most of them will just come and go on their own.
We can both remain aware of that and continue to feel the breath.
And at some point,
You lose that connection with the breath and become completely absorbed in thought.
That is also 100% fine.
In that moment of coming back,
That moment of realizing,
Oh,
I stopped meditating,
You're fully here.
And so that's no reason to get frustrated with yourself.
That is an important part of the practice.
And in that moment of realization,
Acknowledge the thought that captured your attention.
And then release it gently,
Precisely,
Without judgment.
Return your attention to the feeling of the breath.
And then take a fresh start.
And you can do this again and again.
There's no limit to the number of fresh starts that you get.
So we'll sit like this together for a few more minutes in silence.
Feeling the breath,
Letting the mind be as it is.
If you get lost,
Just come back.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
You're welcome.
You're welcome.
You're welcome.
You're welcome.
You're welcome.
With your next exhale,
Just let the technique go.
Thank you so much for your practice.
