Welcome to today's meditation.
Today our meditation will focus on drawing our awareness back to one center,
The point of the breath.
And as we move into this meditation,
You may find that your attention will wander.
That is perfectly normal.
And instead of coming back to focus,
Condemning yourself or feeling down for not staying in focus,
We're going to come back with kindness,
Patience,
And compassion.
And just like you were taking care of a child,
Imagine that your attention,
Straying,
Is the wandering eye of a child.
So let's find ourselves in a comfortable seat,
Sitting up tall,
Softening the eyes,
And taking a few deeper breaths.
And bringing our awareness to the breath.
And feeling the breath can be done so in various different ways.
One is connecting to the feeling,
The sensation of breathing.
And so this is when you watch the breath as it enters in through the nostrils.
And feeling the chest and lungs,
Feeling of the belly,
And then slowly pouring out of the body in just the same way that it came in.
The second way to pay attention to your breath is to count the breath in and count the breath out.
Maybe you notice that your breath as you inhale is a count of three.
And as you exhale is also a count of three.
And you can count your breath and watch,
Bringing the awareness,
The mind,
Completely on the act of breathing.
The third way to draw the awareness into the breath is through mantra.
I know I'm breathing in.
I know I'm breathing out.
And placing the mind as the observer,
Watching this natural,
Unlimited,
And subtle action of life breathing air through the body.
Every time the mind wanders,
Which it will.
Whether it's through a physical distraction,
Or thinking turns on,
Or distraction in the room,
Or sound that you hear beyond your mat.
Notice you've drifted away.
And gently coming back to the breath.
So every time that we do this,
Every time that the mind wanders and we catch it,
As if we are like a cowboy lassoing it back to center.
We are helping to build new neural pathways in the brain.
So we're actually working on changing the brain even subtly.
We are creating more gray matter in the brain,
Which is like an information highway that information can travel.
We're helping to deepen our focus and lengthen our attention span.
I'm changing our thinking patterns.
Because we can do something more productive with a distracted mind.
We can,
Through practice,
Bring that distracted mind back to center.
So every time in our waking life,
As we're out there in the world being distracted,
We have already practiced what it's like to come back again to center.
To come back again to focus.
Let's do this for a little bit longer.
Coming back every time with compassion,
With gentleness.
And I'll ring the same bell when it's time to move again.
.
.
Bringing the awareness back fully to the breath.
If you would like to extend this meditation,
Then I recommend setting a timer.
Choosing one way to draw the awareness back.
One way to focus on the breath,
Whether it's connecting to the sensation of the breathing.
Connecting to your mantra.
Or counting to slow and extend the breath.
If you're ready for this meditation to come to a close and you're ready to continue on in your waking life.
Let's drop the chin to chest and blink the eyes open.
Awakening back to the room that you're in.
Knowing that in this moment you're safe.
In this moment you can choose gratitude.
In this moment you can breathe in what you want for your day and you can breathe out what you want to release.
That even beyond your sight,
You have community that supports you.
Have a beautiful day.
Namaste.
