Welcome to Meditation Medley by Kirsten Doestl.
I suggest you follow this practice in sitting.
Find yourself a comfortable position.
You may choose a chair or the floor and place your body symmetrically,
Ideally with your spine long and allow your hands to rest gently on your lap or beside you on the floor.
Please feel welcome to move for comfort throughout the session.
If you are comfortable to allow your eyelids to drop gently closed.
You may wish to set an intention for this time as you begin to transition and settle in,
Perhaps to remain awake and alert or to be kind to yourself when you notice your attention has wandered.
Or you may wish to offer the positive energies of this practice to someone in particular.
And now release any sense of having to achieve a goal and with genuine care welcome yourself here.
Choosing to do this meditation practice as an act of kindness and compassion to yourself rather than because you need to be any different.
Take a moment now to notice where your attention is.
If it is here ready and waiting enjoy that sense of focus and anticipation consciously noting how that feels for you in your mind and your body.
If your attention is scattered with kindness deliberately catch those distracting thoughts and imagine putting them to the side.
There may be a few sticky thoughts that need to be cleared away just for the time of this session.
It's like clearing the desk or the screen of your mind preparing to be fully here now.
To further anchor into the now moment we begin by tuning into the senses and letting go of the thinking mind.
Begin by noticing the sounds in your environment.
Scan for sounds outside your immediate space.
Just noticing tone and loudness.
Avoid the storytelling about the sound and in that truly mindful manner simply observe.
Notice that sounds come from and return to silence.
Invite your noticing in closer.
Perhaps there are sounds in the room.
Can you hear the sounds of your body breathing?
Make the focus slide away from sound and notice now the images in front of your eyes moving or still,
Colours and shapes.
Sense that you are simply observing.
Allow the images to arise.
You're not going out after them.
You're not looking for them.
They're just there for you to view.
Invite your focus to shift now to your mouth.
Notice the position of your tongue.
Allow the tip of your tongue to rest behind your top teeth and the rest of your tongue fat and soft in the bottom of your mouth.
Can you notice any taste or flavours?
Now guide your noticing to take in the sense and smells in your space.
Let your awareness shift now to the sense of touch and pressure.
Notice the weight-bearing areas of your body.
Notice the areas that feel free.
Can you feel the temperature on your exposed skin?
Can you sense the coverings or clothing against your skin?
Become aware of the angles of your joints in space.
You may notice the sensation of pain or discomfort.
Please tweak your position for comfort or if the discomfort does not ease,
Take a moment to breathe in and around that area,
Expanding and allowing space there.
Sense your whole body and where it sits in the space,
Thus calling in an awareness of the room around you,
A sense of you in this space.
Now deliberately fade the volume of noticing the senses and prepare to turn inward.
Begin by checking into your emotional state right now.
Emotions come and go.
Can you name the emotion that you're experiencing right now?
Where does it sit on the scale of that type of emotion?
For example,
Mildly irritated scales up to irate.
Do you have the language to accurately reflect the subtlety of your emotions?
How is the busyness of your mind right now?
This is just information,
So no judgment.
Perhaps your thoughts are flowing like a swift river or meandering like a slow stream.
Check in again to your attention and invite in a sense of presence to this moment for and by yourself.
Presence,
That state where we are fully attentive.
Cultivate a feeling of aliveness in your body,
In every cell.
Invite curiosity and interest over a background of trust and safety.
Clarity,
Anticipation,
A sense of friendliness and spaciousness.
Become truly present in every cell in this moment.
Engage with a light attitude.
Too much concentrating leads to stress,
Too little attention and you may snooze off.
Light and attentive.
Know that this state of calm clarity is innate in all of us.
These steps simply remind us of how we can be.
Bring your hands to your heart space and allow a small smile to grace your face.
Follow with your attention and feel the warmth of your hands.
Imagine opening your heart space.
Appreciate yourself for taking the time to do this practice and for bringing yourself fully to the experience.
Perhaps your active mind has wandered already.
This of course is the nature of your wonderful mind.
You may wish to take these steps lovingly to bring yourself back online.
First when you notice that your mind has wandered,
Ah this is how it feels to lose focus.
Yay me,
I'm learning how that feels and that I can redirect my attention.
So you may wish to say to yourself,
Not now thank you mind,
I'm staying with the dialogue.
And consciously notice how focus and attention feels to you.
All of this done with a kind tone and words and you will probably need to do this many many times.
I invite you to come now to your body and to lead your muscles to a restful state.
Throughout this next section we spend longer on the let go and you may notice that I do not use the word relax.
Bring your attention to your forehead and slightly tighten into a small frown and then soften and release.
Sense a smoothing between the eyebrows.
Then notice your scalp firm up as if you have a tight hat on your head,
Tension building in the scalp and then soften.
Imagine opening around every hair follicle as you release and loosen the scalp.
Bring your awareness to your eyes and close them a little more tightly.
Feel the tension in the little muscles around the eyes and then let go.
Imagine allowing your eyeballs to sink deep into the sockets.
Your eyelids are resting gently closed like soft velvety curtains.
Now notice your muscles of facial expression and tighten very slightly around the mouth and nose and then soften,
Release.
Allow a sense and a feeling of serenity in your facial muscles.
Notice your jaw and allow it to unlock and drop back.
Tongue fat and soft in the bottom of your mouth,
Teeth a little bit apart.
Allow your throat to be fat and soft.
Trickle your attention around to the muscles at the back of your neck.
If you are lying gently push your head into the floor then release.
If you are sitting firm the muscles that hold your head upright and then gradually release.
You'll need a little tension to hold the head but let go any excess.
Consciously and deliberately allow your shoulders to drop away from your ears.
This whole neck and head area imagine the tension melting as ice melts to water.
Then invite your noticing awareness down to your arms,
Left and right arms and just in the position they're in.
Firm the muscles around the bones,
Feel the tension build,
Then let go and drop again.
Allow the arms to feel heavy and supported.
Notice your hands now stretch fingers and thumbs open and away then release and let go and soften again.
Fingers probably coming to a slightly curled position,
Palms soft.
Now gather your attention to the muscles that travel down either side of the spine beginning at the bottom of the neck,
Moving through the upper back,
The mid back and to the low back.
Firm up those postural muscles then release and soften.
If you're in lying,
Surrender into the support and let go completely.
If you're in sitting,
Holding a little bit of postural tension but otherwise softening,
Letting go.
Sense into your belly and allow it to be soft,
Simply moving with breath.
Notice the muscles of the pelvic floor.
If you're holding out the excess tension here,
Soften and let go.
Feel a sense of safety in your support,
Allowing your muscles to release.
Invite your attention to your legs,
Just in the position that they're in.
Firm up those big muscles of the thighs then let go.
Switch off,
Power down.
Just simply allow the muscles to hang off the bones.
Travel your attention further towards the lower legs and by gently pulling your toes up towards your face you'll feel a stretch at the calf and muscle activity at the front of the legs.
Then let go,
Unwind,
Switch off.
Invite your attention down to your feet,
Slightly curling your toes.
Feel that tension in the muscles and release.
Soften,
Let go.
Sense your feet feeling wide and soft.
No effort required.
Notice your whole body.
How does it feel when the muscles are resting?
You are awake and alert but as you've traveled through your body releasing,
Softening,
Letting go any excess tension.
Sense how this feels in your physical body.
Now with the soft body notice your breath.
Pay attention again to your belly and release any tension that may have crept into this area and allow your next breath in to expand the belly.
As you breathe in the belly rises and as you let the air flow out your belly drops.
Your body breathes itself.
Check that you have let the out breath go completely,
That you have allowed all the air to empty from your lungs and notice the slight pause,
The slight space before your body breathes in.
Notice now where you feel breathing,
Perhaps at your nostrils,
Maybe at your belly,
Perhaps your side body.
Take an imaginary sensory walk around your body as you breathe.
Can you feel subtle movement at your back body,
Perhaps a slight bulging at your low back,
A slight forward movement of your sternum,
The cage of the ribs expanding out towards the arms.
Imagine every cell of your body being breathed,
Nothing for you to do.
Observe the miracle of breath,
Your whole body breathing.
Cells inspire and breathe,
Your breath always here to anchor and support.
With that knowledge of the grounding breath being there and the soft body invite your attention now to rest upon your sensory experience of your mental activity.
How do you experience thought,
Images or words or both or perhaps a sense of the thought?
Consciously watch now the arising and passing of your thoughts.
Deliberately become alert to your mental activity.
Notice that thoughts often arise unbidden.
Thoughts can be amazing and useful.
They may expand into an emotion and often with that comes a body sensation.
Notice also that we can direct our thoughts consciously now choose a happy joyful thought and notice where in your body this is echoed.
Where can you feel a sensation change perhaps around your heart space,
Your throat,
Your head,
Your belly?
Now choose a slightly upsetting thought and seek for its echo.
Once again perhaps belly,
Throat and now let that go.
Developing the ability to notice and observe thoughts eventually allows us also to direct our thoughts in a more comfortable way.
Return to observing your thoughts and if possible let them pass rather than becoming involved in the thought.
Simply allow the thoughts to glide past your awareness and noticing.
You have a sense of awake,
Alert and observing.
Now I invite you to leave your thinking mind and come back to your body.
Make any adjustments for comfort.
Release any tension that may have snuck in.
Sense the outside boundary of your skin,
The bag of your body.
Perhaps you notice it through the sensation of pressure,
Temperature.
Now feel into the space around your body.
Let your thinking brain go and sense just beyond your skin all the way around and over your body as if you were sensing water in a deep bath.
Gather attention to your scalp and then drift inside your skull.
Feel the volume and space of your brain.
Feel your eyeballs resting in the eye sockets.
Can you get a sense of the depth of the eye sockets?
Drop into the cavity of your mouth.
Rest your gentle awareness at your throat.
Many emotions are held here in the throat.
Can you soften and allow whatever is there to bubble up?
Travel your awareness out along your collarbones,
Elegant length of bone and feel and sense that your arm bones just hang off your shoulders.
Now sense the volume and space of your arms left and right.
Travel inside the bag of the skin,
Down to your hands.
Bring attention to the palms.
You may feel fuzzy or tingly sensation here.
Return to your trunk.
Feel the breath moving your chest and belly.
Venture inside with your loving awareness to your heart space.
What is here for you now?
Perhaps a sensation of openness or tightness.
Perhaps it may feel soft or sharp or constricted.
These sensations may correlate with an emotion or a feeling for you.
Ask your wise body,
What does this sensation mean to me?
What emotion does this match for me?
Hear your body speak.
Travel further toward your solar plexus.
Again,
Gently feel and see what is here now.
Sometimes the sensations here within are very subtle and as we become more familiar we can interpret the body more clearly.
Now drop to the energetic center of your body,
The Hara just below your belly button and a bit inside.
Churning or calm.
Maybe you even have a sense of a color or a shape.
Lower now,
Noticing the perineal area.
What sensations are here?
Visit the hip joints left and right,
The ball and socket joints.
Travel the inside of your strong legs,
Long strong thigh bones,
Resting strength of thigh muscles.
Sensing this space from the inside out.
Acknowledge the complex and wonderful knee joints.
Skim down your lower leg bones,
Feel the calf muscles drop in and around your ankle joints.
Flow your attention along the foot bones,
Right to the end of your toes,
Then up into the soft arches of your feet.
Expand your feeling again and notice your whole body inside to out,
Then the outside boundary to a little bit further from your skin in every direction.
You,
The whole of you in this space.
Contemplating our body invites the practice of appreciation.
Thank you body.
Continuing the concept of appreciation bring to mind something quite ordinary in your life that you can be appreciative of or grateful for.
Something that you don't need to be any different than it is for you to sense gratitude.
Perhaps your access to this resource of Insight Timer,
The opportunity to have time to do this.
There are many other facts for which you can conjure consciousness of gratitude.
Recall some of these things now and as you do notice how appreciation feels in your body.
What is the energetic felt signature of appreciation?
And tend to hold this sense and feeling for the next little while as you wrap up the intensity of the emotion of appreciation.
Now let that fade and shift emotion to compassion.
Once again notice your hand on your heart space.
Allow your imagination mind to find compassion,
A sense of support,
Understanding and acceptance,
Honesty,
Safety and security.
Allow your heart to feel open to offering these emotions to a loved person or animal in your life.
Feel the ease with which you flow this compassionate support to that being.
You hold them as you know them to be,
As you offer support,
Love,
Understanding,
Acceptance.
Imagine and feel this energy expanding from you toward that person or being and then easily and generously offer this same authentic compassion to others.
And feel once again to the warmth of your hands and receive this compassion from yourself for yourself.
Bask in the energy of self-compassion.
Let that go now,
Allowing images to fade and simply notice that you are here now,
A light easy attention,
Awake and alert,
Calm and knowing that all is fine in this moment,
That you can confidently sink into release,
Real ease in this moment.
Let these words float over and through your being as you feel into how this state is for you.
Calm,
Ease,
Peace,
Grace,
Open,
Safe,
Light,
Softened,
Gentle,
Grounded,
Receiving,
Engaged,
Stable,
Trusting.
I will stay quiet for a moment as you allow yourself to rest into simply being.
Now as we begin to transition,
Check in with your body sensation,
Touch,
Pressure,
Begin to make a few small stretching movements,
Notice the images in front of your eyes,
Tune in to smell and taste,
Check your emotional state,
Be deliberately aware of your mental activity,
Sense the overall experience of this time,
Inviting a deeper breath and open your eyes,
Begin to engage with the space around you as you transition into your next activity with gentleness to yourself,
Taking your time,
Moving,
Stretching,
Perhaps a yawn.
Thank you for sharing this session with me.
Go well.
