Welcome.
I'm so glad you're here.
We're gonna do a brief,
Simple practice to welcome emotion with self-compassion.
I do this every night because it helps me to create an open field of being with myself and my emotions in such a way that when I wake up in the middle of the night,
My thoughts are less likely to disrupt the process of going back to sleep.
As you can learn more about in my course on healing the emotions that fuel relationship conflict,
It's important to have practices where we welcome emotion.
And in that course,
You can learn about this either for the purposes of being less triggered to emotionality and reactive behavior during fights and arguments,
Or simply because you want to transform your relationship with feelings.
Doing this brief practice once a day,
For instance,
Will build your ability to welcome and experience your feelings and move through them.
And in the course,
There's a few other practices that I teach.
So,
Let's begin.
Just taking a moment to connect to body sensations,
To briefly ground yourself.
Notice the sensations that accompany the breath.
Maybe the rise and fall of the belly,
Or the brush of the air in the nostrils,
Allowing the body to sink just a little bit with every out-breath into the support of the chair or furniture.
The floor,
The building,
And indeed the entire earth that is supporting you right now.
Now,
Turning to yourself with loving-kindness.
You may want to imagine an embrace of light all around your body,
Or say loving words to yourself,
Even just saying to yourself,
Hi,
Sweetheart,
Or just saying your name,
However it feels accessible and good to you to turn to yourself with loving-kindness.
Next,
Ask yourself,
How are you?
What's going on for you right now?
With a sense of compassionate interest,
If that's present for you,
And if what you can do is focus on these steps,
But the feeling is not there for you,
That's okay too.
Just bringing your attention back to concentrate on these steps as best you can,
Whatever the emotion experience is.
So asking yourself,
How are you?
And scanning your body to notice how you are right now,
Seeing if you can find an experience that you can put into a word or two,
So that it's not a thought,
But rather a sensation or a feeling.
So for instance,
Cold air on my hands,
Or expansion of the breath,
Back firm against the chair.
So you see,
It's a little more than two words,
But just a brief description of something that is embodied,
That is a body experience for you right now.
And whatever that is,
Not being too concerned about whether it's good or not good,
The next step is now to just say,
Back against the chair,
Welcome.
So at first we say the words as they come up,
Nervousness,
And then saying inside,
Nervousness,
And beginning again,
And again,
Streaming loving kindness towards yourself in whatever way is possible for you,
Or delightful for you.
Hi,
Sweetie.
How are you?
Scanning for a here and now experience that can be put briefly into words,
Picking one,
Saying those words,
And then,
Welcome.
Continuing with this two or three more times,
Seeing if you can alternate between neutral,
Pleasant,
And unpleasant experiences.
I like to end with something unpleasant,
And reach a place where I can feel I'm opening a window of attention.
And allowing whatever that unpleasant sensation is,
Or it can feel like fanning out my gentle curiosity to hold whatever's there.
But you can,
Of course,
Choose whatever kind of experience or sensation you wanna end with.
Well,
Thank you for being here.
I'm wishing you well.
