A meditation to help during uncertain times.
In this meditation,
We can use the image of a strong,
Sturdy tree rooted in the ground to help us feel a little more rooted in being.
During difficult times and uncertainty,
We often leave our bodies and it becomes easy to be lost in thought.
It's helpful to remember that there's a natural resiliency in our DNA and it is in our human condition to survive difficult times.
Whether it's a pandemic,
Natural disaster,
War,
Social unrest,
It's in our human condition to move forward.
Meditation can give us tools and inner resources to help us feel stable,
Centered,
And rooted in place.
So we'll start our practice by taking a comfortable seat,
Sitting up nice and tall in a chair or a cushion.
And start by feeling the weight of your body,
Your seated posture,
The pull of gravity,
And relax.
Let the earth hold you and support you however you have arrived.
And now imagine your body is like a great tree and that you have roots that are going deep down into the earth.
Take a full breath in and with your inhalation,
Imagine these roots move deeper into the foundation below you.
And with the exhalation,
You relax a little more.
With your next inhalation,
Imagine these roots reaching deeper through the soil below you and deeper into the earth itself,
Like the roots of a great redwood tree or oak tree.
And settling in with your exhalation.
You can imagine your torso is like the stable trunk of a tree.
And even with a variety of weather patterns,
Wind,
Rain,
Storms,
You stay steady in the midst of it all.
Now bring your attention to the whole field of your body,
Sensing the energy moving through the body.
Perhaps a tingling sensation,
Areas of warmth or coolness.
You might notice the temperature of the air in the room or outside on your skin.
Taking a moment to notice any sensations of heavy or light,
Any feelings of contraction or release.
Just noticing.
Feeling the whole field of your body.
And if there are any areas of tension,
Just bring your awareness to that area and soften.
Allowing that part of the body to relax a little bit more.
Keeping your awareness onto the body,
Sensations in the body.
And taking a moment to feel a sense of compassion and kindness for this body.
This body that has carried you through life,
The highs and lows for so long.
Take a moment to offer your body a healing sense of compassion and thanking your body for carrying you this far through your life.
You can simply offer a silent thank you,
A sense of gratitude for your body's innate ability to heal and to forge ahead.
Now breathe in a little deeper,
Perhaps reconnecting with the roots,
Reaching down into the earth and relaxing a little more into your exhalation.
Now bring your attention into the area of your heart.
You might just start with the simple awareness of your own heart beating.
Knowing that your heart beats for you without you asking it to do so.
Noticing any sensation in the heart area.
Are there any areas of tension or flow,
Lightness or heaviness?
Are there any emotions in the heart space?
Nothing fabricated.
Just allowing any emotion to be there and be known just as it is.
Nothing to resist,
Nothing to hold on to.
Just noticing.
And now let's bring a sense of gratitude for your heart that has cared so much over the years.
The heart that has loved,
Grieved,
Ached,
Cared.
Bringing a sense of compassion.
Taking a moment just to say thank you.
Thank you to your heart for caring so much.
And rest here for a few moments with gratitude for the courage and the boundlessness of your own heart.
And let's take another full breath in.
You might feel a sense of openness,
Spaciousness in the heart.
And with your exhalation,
Feeling a sense of ease,
A sense of letting go.
And now let's bring the awareness to the mind.
Your mind that does so much for you to problem solve,
Planning,
Organizing,
Reviewing,
Learning.
And just noticing the quality of the mind here.
Is the mind busy?
Quiet?
Somewhere in between?
Is your mind jumping from thought to thought?
Or maybe there's a little space in between thoughts.
Just noticing.
And we'll take a moment to bring a sense of compassion and care to the mind.
A sense of gratitude for the mind that has worked so hard to problem solve and has worked so hard to keep you safe and protected.
And just saying a silent thank you to your mind.
A sense of gratitude for the mind for being concerned for yourself and for others.
A moment of gratitude for the mind,
Capacity of your mind,
Especially in difficult situations.
Just resting here with a sense of loving kindness for the mind.
And now expand your awareness to include the body,
The heart,
And the mind.
And just becoming the witness of it all.
Take a moment now to notice that beyond your physical sensations in the body,
Beyond your feelings or emotions in the heart,
And beyond the thoughts in your mind is an expansive awareness of it all.
Consciousness itself.
This is your true nature.
Rest here.
Just a few final moments here.
Resting in conscious awareness of loving and gentle presence.
And I'll finish with a poem by Nikita Gill.
It's called You Have Become a Forest.
One day when you wake up,
You will find that you have become a forest.
You have grown roots and found strength in them that no one thought you had.
You've become stronger and more beautiful,
Full of life-giving qualities.
You've learned to take all the negativity around you and turn it into oxygen for easy breathing.
A host of wild creatures live inside you and you call them stories.
A variety of beautiful birds rest inside your mind and you call them memories.
You have become an incredible self-sustaining thing of epic proportions and you should be so proud of yourself,
Of how far you have come from the seeds of who you used to be.
