Close your eyes or lower your gaze.
Take a full breath in through your nose and exhale through your mouth.
Take a moment to scan from the top of your head down through the back of your neck,
The length of your shoulders,
Your arms and your hands,
The entirety of your torso down into your hips,
Your thighs,
Your knees and your feet.
From crown of head to tip of toes.
Let yourself settle in and relax.
As the body relaxes,
Allow yourself to notice what's happening in the mind.
Any thought patterns,
Any feelings,
Any emotions.
In particular,
Anything you can't let go of.
Noticing if anything's weighing heavy on you or feels difficult.
Instead of pushing that emotion aside,
Allow yourself to breathe it in.
So as you breathe in the difficulty,
Feel your whole body expand and fill with that emotion.
And as you breathe it out,
Allow yourself to find ease of the whole body to feel ease.
If you're feeling heaviness as we breathe in,
We'll breathe in that heaviness,
Feel it throughout your body,
Your mind.
As we breathe out,
We'll find lightness,
Allowing ourselves to feel that lightness.
Continuing to use the breath to breathe into what might be heavy or difficult,
To breathe out ease and lightness.
Allowing yourself to fill the whole space with these emotions as you breathe them in and breathe them out.
Breathing in anger and breathing out forgiveness.
Breathing in frustration.
Breathing out joy.
Breathing in hatred.
And breathing out love.
Continuing to move through your emotions and just noticing what's present for you.
What do you need to breathe in?
And what do you need to breathe out?
If anything feels too difficult to breathe in or breathe out,
Just set it aside and place it on a mental shelf.
Know that we'll come back to it on a day when we're ready.
Choosing what feels attainable to you right now.
If there are too many emotions to sort through,
Choose just one,
Just for this practice,
Just for right here and right now.
Choose one emotion that you want to breathe in,
Something that might be ailing you or hurting you.
Then breathing out its positive opposite.
Breathing in your suffering.
Breathing out your own joy.
Letting this meditation and this breath work change your relationship to the stressors in your life,
The things that may be weighing you down,
Preventing you from moving forward or thinking clearly.
As you move through this practice,
You may notice that new things start to arise.
Just as you let go of one emotion,
Another one pops up.
We continue the practice.
We continue the breath.
Continue to breathe in what's difficult and breathe out a sense of ease.
Breathing in the pain and breathing out the comfort.
Breathing in our sorrow and breathing out our happiness.
Breathing in our loss and breathing out our gain.
Breathing in our judgment and breathing out our acceptance.
Slowly dipping our toe into a space where we just let go of the energy that isn't serving us.
And we choose to fill that space with energy that fulfills us,
Energy that makes us feel whole and happy and healthy.
You feel lost in this practice.
Come back to your heart space.
Listen to what your heart has to say.
And if a person,
A place,
Or a thing keeps popping up for you,
I want you to breathe in that difficult person in your life and breathe out compassion and healing for that person.
A difficult place or thing arises,
Breathe in exactly that.
Breathing out a sense of joy,
Peace,
And equanimity for that place or thing.
I want you to breathe in joy for yourself and breathe out joy for yourself.
Again filling your whole space with a sense of joy,
Meaning,
Purpose,
Gratitude,
And breathing out joy,
Meaning,
Purpose,
And gratitude.
Breathing in your wholeness,
Your compassion,
Your sensibility.
Breathing out that wholeness,
Compassion,
And sensibility.
Breathing into compassion for yourself.
Breathing into compassion for those whom you love.
Breathing into compassion for all of the people in your life.
Breathing into compassion even for your enemies.
Breathing into compassion for the entire world,
For everyone.
Notice how this compassion begins with you and extends outward to the entire universe.
Continue to let your breath be your guide.
Continue to give yourself permission to breathe in and out,
To allow the whole of the universe that surrounds you to be a place of joy,
Understanding,
Forgiveness,
And well-being.
Welcome to continue breathing in this space.
If you're ready to come out,
Do so slowly.
As you blink the eyes open,
Allow yourself to see the world anew and to see the beauty and even the most simple of objects.
And allow that sense of beauty to travel out into everything you do and everyone you meet.
