10-Minute Shamatha Practice

10-Minute Shamatha guided meditation practice with Jenna Hollenstein. Jenna Hollenstein, MS, RD, CDN, is a nutrition therapist, meditation teacher, and author. Her work combines intuitive eating, trauma-sensitive mindfulness, polyvagal theory, and other embodied modalities. Her latest books include Eat to Love: A Mindful Guide to Transforming Your Relationship with Food, Body, and Life and Intuitive Eating for Life: How Mindfulness Can Deepen and Sustain Your Intuitive Eating Practice.

Transcript

So find whatever is a comfortable posture for you this morning.

Just take a moment to notice any sensations or states in your body and see if you could welcome them,

Accommodate them,

Experiment with not wishing them to be any different than they are.

And with your body as it is,

With your mind as it is,

Find the physical posture that represents a balance of rest and effort.

If you're sitting down,

You might feel a sensation of rooting down through the sits bones and lifting up gently through the crown of the head,

Facilitating a full,

Spacious breath,

Releasing any gripping or tension that's not necessary for this uplifted posture.

Sometimes we add unnecessary holding.

You might have to come back again and again and release it.

I always do.

Let the mouth be closed,

But gently so.

And the eyes are open with a gentle downward gaze that can take in the full visual field without really looking or staring at anything in particular.

The breath is normal in and out through the nose if you can.

And feel your body breathing.

Try to stay with that momentary sensation of breath coming in and going out,

Knowing that anchoring your mind's attention to the sensation of the breath allows the body and the mind to be in the same place at the same time.

And even as you place your attention with intention on the feeling of the breath,

You can still be aware of your surroundings,

Of your internal environment.

You still see,

Hear,

Feel,

And you still think.

Your mind's job is to create thought,

And that is not a problem at all.

We're not trying to stop thinking.

We're not trying to think a certain way.

Just trying to be with ourselves as we are.

Could you be with yourself just as you are right now?

So as you're feeling your breath,

You're probably aware of thoughts.

Many of them will come and go on their own.

Sometimes they stick around for a little bit.

It doesn't really matter.

As long as you can maintain a connection,

Even a 1% connection with the feeling of breath,

There's nothing else you need to do.

If at some point you find that thoughts take you away completely from the breath and you forget that you're meditating,

Just acknowledge that whenever you realize,

And then release it gently and precisely,

Guiding your attention back to the feeling of the breath to take a fresh start.

Let the technique go,

And adjust any limbs that might have fallen asleep.

Thank you so much for your practice.