Bell This practice is a 10 minute guided sitting meditation.
Bringing your awareness to posture,
Whether sitting on a chair,
A stool or the floor.
Allowing posture to be comfortable,
Both alert and relaxed.
You may wish to close the eyes or lower the gaze downwards towards the floor.
The intention of this practice is to deliberately cultivate mindfulness of the present moment,
The being mode.
So bringing the awareness now to the breath,
The in-breath,
The out-breath,
Perhaps the little spaces between each in-breath and each out-breath.
Directing your awareness to the sensations of the breath.
You may notice the breath at the nostrils,
The rise and fall of the chest or abdomen.
And coming with the focus on the breath,
Connecting to the here and now experience.
And then shifting your awareness to body sensations.
Aware of how the body feels.
Expand the attention around these sensations.
You may be aware of sensations in the body as a whole,
Or of particular sensations in certain areas.
You may notice temperature,
Skin sensations,
Skin sensations of contact with the floor or chair.
Perhaps sensations deeper in the body,
Perhaps hunger or satiety.
See if it's possible to observe and notice.
And sometimes when we pay attention to sensations,
We may notice a tensing or bracing.
And if this is the case,
See if you can soften and release.
As you pay attention to sensations,
You may notice discomfort,
Pain,
Perhaps urges to move the body.
See if it's possible to observe his urges.
Perhaps to hold with gentle awareness,
Any awareness.
Of pain or discomfort.
You're working around the edges of any pain or discomfort.
Sometimes we can use the breath to breathe into these areas.
Breathing into,
Exploring and examining any particular discomfort.
Breathing out of,
Releasing and letting go.
Noticing any particular sensations or waves of sensations.
And with a gentle curiosity or interest,
Noticing how these sensations shift and move and change.
Sitting and observing.
Bringing a sense of kindness and curiosity to sensations in the moment.
And then shifting awareness to listening to sound.
Noticing the tone,
The quality and volume of any sounds.
The duration of sounds.
And how sounds are constantly changing.
Seeing the sounds as waves.
Rather than getting caught up with naming sounds,
Judging sounds,
Analyzing sounds.
See if it's possible,
Rather than labeling sounds,
To experience and observe the wave of sounds,
Moment by moment.
And in the same way that we observe the waves of sounds,
Coming and going,
I invite you to observe thoughts.
Thoughts as events that come and go in the field of your awareness.
Seeing the thoughts arising and then passing away.
And in noticing thoughts and observing thoughts,
You may find yourself getting caught up with thoughts.
Moving from being into doing mind.
Planning and reacting to the thoughts.
Rather than merely observing and noticing.
And if this happens,
This is okay.
This is part of mind wandering and what the mind does.
Let's see if you can gently acknowledge when this happens.
And bring the awareness back to observing thoughts as events that come and go in the mind.
And it might be as you do this that the mind empties and stills.
Or it could be that the mind is full.
A little like observing a train as it passes through the station.
Observing thoughts as they pass through.
At any time,
Bringing the awareness back to the anchor of the breath,
If needed.
Acknowledging the challenge of becoming aware of thinking.
Using the breath as an anchor whenever you need to.
Expanding the attention to include emotions and sensations.
Bringing an interest and curiosity to noticing.
Sensations associated with our emotions.
Remembering that there's no goal to doing this practice.
The mind will wander.
And our challenge is to just become aware of the mind.
Our challenge is to learn the skills of observing.
Bring the awareness now back to the breath.
Back to breathing.
Back to a focus on the in-breath and a focus on the out-breath.
Noticing and observing.
The breathing.
Your breath.
Your anchor to the present moment.
And as we finish this practice,
Congratulating yourself for taking the time to develop mindfulness as a skill in everyday life.
Thank you for watching!
