Hello and welcome.
My name is Jen,
And I am so glad you're here.
Today I'm going to be walking us through an anchors of attention practice.
Often.
Our lives can be so busy.
Whether with actual activities and tasks that we have to do every day.
Or just the busyness of the mind,
Everything we feel like we want to work through,
Things that we are remembering or planning for,
That sometimes we get to the end of a busy day.
And we find ourselves asking,
Where did the day go?
What did I even do today?
We may have.
Accomplished a lot or gone through all the motions of the day but felt like we didn't even experience it.
Sitting to practice.
And focusing our attention.
Can help us bring a little bit more awareness to our everyday life.
And when we sit to practice in this way.
Over time,
It can help us feel a little bit more grounded and centered.
In the midst of everything that's going on around us.
In this practice,
I'm going to guide us through.
The use of four different anchors of attention.
The feet.
The seat.
The hands and the breath.
And after that,
I'll encourage you to focus your attention on whichever of those four anchors seems most accessible to you today.
Let's get started by finding a comfortable seat.
Maybe on the floor.
A cushion.
A chair.
Whatever works for you today.
And just sitting.
In an upright posture.
Back nice and straight.
But not too stiff or rigid.
And if it feels good to you today,
Maybe closing the eyes or softening the gaze.
And just taking a moment to settle in.
Noticing what it feels like to find some relative stillness.
Maybe noticing the sounds around you in the space.
Noticing whatever is here for you right now.
In the body,
In the mind.
And then moving right into the practice,
Starting with the feet.
Focusing our attention.
On the sensations of the feet.
And as we go through this practice,
The idea is just to.
Gently.
Keep bringing your attention back to the anchor.
Just noticing whatever is there right now in this moment.
The mind will almost certainly wander off.
That's just what it does.
And when that happens,
Just noticing it and bringing your attention right back,
In this case,
To the feet.
What is there to be felt in the feet?
Maybe the sensation of the feet resting on the floor.
If you're wearing socks or shoes.
Feeling the texture or the pressure of whatever your feet are in.
If you're not wearing socks and shoes,
Maybe noticing the temperature of the air.
Just noticing whatever there is to be felt in the feet.
Now moving up to the seat.
The sensation of our sit bones on the surface underneath us,
Whether that's a chair.
The floor,
A cushion.
Maybe noticing the feeling of gravity.
Holding us down.
Any pressure or other sensations?
In that part of the body grounding us down.
Just noticing what's here.
Moving on to the hands.
Maybe the feeling of the hands resting on the lap.
Or making contact with each other.
Maybe noticing sensation in the fingers,
The palms,
The back of the hands.
Temperature of the air.
What is here now to be noticed in the hands?
And now moving to the breath.
Wherever you feel it most strongly.
Maybe it's the feeling of air entering through the nose.
The sensation of the air hitting the back of the throat.
The chest rising and falling.
Maybe the belly.
Not trying to breathe in any certain kind of way.
Or change the breath at all.
Just noticing how it is.
Maybe deep or shallow.
Fast or slow.
Just seeing how it is.
And now for the remainder of the practice.
Selecting the anchor.
That feels most accessible to you today.
The feet.
The seat.
The hands.
Or the breath.
And again,
Just gently.
Bringing the attention.
Back to that anchor.
Anytime it wanders off.
When we notice that our mind has gone somewhere else.
It can be helpful to just note what the mind is doing.
Whether it's remembering.
Planning.
Storytelling.
Daydreaming.
Just placing that mental note on whatever's happening in the mind.
And then coming right back to the anchor.
That exercise of noting can help us.
Not get too attached or wrapped up in whatever's going on in the mind.
So we can just gently note it.
And then return right back to the anchor.
What is there to be known?
Or noticed.
In your chosen anchor in this moment.
Remembering not to be hard on ourselves if the mind is busy and keeps wandering off.
The mind wanders off a thousand times.
That's a thousand times to notice it and be mindful and come back to the anchor.
That is the practice.
If the mind.
Has wandered off.
Remembering we can note where it's gone and come right back.
Now at this point in the practice,
We can widen our attention.
Into the whole body.
Starting to notice sounds in the space around us.
Just allowing our attention to broaden again.
In a moment.
I will ring the bell three times.
Which will conclude our formal sitting practice for today.
But remembering that we can take this same sense of awareness into the rest of our day.
Into everyday moments.
To help us experience our life as it happens.
And to get out of autopilot.
Being with our life as it unfolds,
Moment by moment.
Thank you for your practice.
You you you
