Today we're going to explore awareness through the senses.
Find a comfortable posture.
The most important thing is that your back is straight.
But gently straight.
Kind of in a restful,
Comfortable position.
But you're attentive,
Awake,
Present.
And kind of.
Giving a type of dignity.
To the posture.
Allow yourself to take a couple of inhales and exhales.
Bring back all the parts of you that you may have left somewhere else in your day.
Just allow that surface level of tension to just fall away as if you're standing under some kind of warm rain.
And everywhere the water touches you.
The tension that you had just melts down into the ground.
Now we're going to explore.
Sounds.
As a method to engage the senses and enhance our awareness.
It's so simple.
Going to allow.
The sounds that you hear wherever you are.
To just enter in through your ears.
And you simply notice them.
We can start with pleasant sounds.
Maybe you hear the birds chirping.
Or your own heartbeat.
Allow yourself to simply be aware of these sounds.
Know that you're hearing them.
Emotions,
Thoughts,
Sensations.
They're always going to come when we're meditating.
Can allow them.
To be there.
Kind of allow them to dissolve or just kind of fade away into the background.
Or if there's an emotion or a thought or a sensation that's so persistent.
It's okay to apply self-compassion.
Continue to hear the sounds.
But also acknowledge that sensation or that thought is there.
With an option for them to kind of come and go.
If you get distracted,
And you realize that you stopped paying attention to listening to the sounds.
Just notice that and come back.
Another thing we can do.
Is to rub our hands together.
And just cup your ears for a moment.
And close your eyes.
Take a couple deep breaths.
With your hands cupping your ears.
With your mind.
Feel the inside of your ears.
Can you kind of travel down one ear at a time?
Inside.
Where the ear tube goes and the brain.
Or the head,
I'm not even sure where the ear tube goes.
Follow.
And then feel the other ear.
Bring awareness to the ear lobes.
That part of your body is kind of waking up.
You can even take your hands.
And kind of pinch your earlobes and kind of rub them from the bottom where you put earrings in,
Wiggle them.
And rub them all along the outside of the ear where an acupuncture person might put the needles.
And kind of tug on your ears a little bit,
Wake them up.
Okay,
Next part is to listen to the neutral sounds that you hear.
Maybe it's background noises,
White noise,
The hum of the fridge.
Maybe there's a hum of traffic outside.
It depends where you are.
With some courage.
Together we can expand our circle of awareness and attention.
To challenging sounds.
Maybe there's honking or dogs barking or.
.
.
The ones that drive me nuts are the little eee noises from electronic devices.
Whatever your challenging sounds are.
Let's just try to open the heart and the patience.
And just let them.
And turn to our ears.
To our scent stores.
And then observe.
The impact they have on our mind,
Our body.
Our emotions,
What are you noticing?
Good job.
Now,
Let's rest in silence.
The kind of silence that can hold.
All these different sounds.
Get underneath that silence.
And maybe you're hearing every sound,
Pleasant,
Unpleasant,
Neutral,
All at once.
There's an invitation to go deeper.
And to find an unshakable stillness.
Just beneath those sounds inside yourself.
In this space,
You can let go of trying to bring your awareness anything in particular.
And simply rest and enjoy feeling your own inner goodness.
Your own inner peacefulness and stillness.
With a type of acceptance.
Of everything being exactly the way it is,
Maybe imperfect.
Of being okay.
With this moment manifesting exactly as it is right now.
And we've come to the end of this meditation.
You may want to wiggle your toes,
Gently open your eyes,
Take a stretch.
Thank you so much.
