Goodbye Old. Hello New. – Basic Breath Meditation

The focus of the ‘Basic Breath Meditation’ is to help you tune into the movement of your breath in your body and to calm your mind. This breathing meditation supports you in doing the other self-inquiry exercises of the journal 'Goodbye Old. Hello New.’ which is written by Marianne de Kuyper. All exercises focus on helping you reconnect to yourself, tuning in to your inner voice and discovering your deepest needs and wishes.

Transcript

Hello and welcome. Welcome to one of the meditations that I'll be sharing with you in the next couple of weeks that are linked to the journal Goodbye Old, Hello New. In all of the reflections I will help you tune in and reconnect to your inner voice so you can feel your deepest needs and wishes and move forward from that place of knowing. One thing that can definitely help you on this path is to reconnect to the movement of the breath in your body. That's what we'll do today. I would like you to make yourself comfortable either in a chair, In the bed or on the ground. What's important is that you can feel the ground underneath your feet and then you keep your spine straight and you reach your crown up to the roof, Ceiling, Sky. And then rest your hands somewhere in your lap or maybe on your thighs or if you would like to maybe one on your belly and one on the heart or maybe both on the chest. And then notice whether you can feel the breath moving in your body. Notice the breath in your body. Can you feel the sensation of the breath moving inside of your body? Can you feel the expansion of the inhale and the contraction of the exhale? Can you feel the expansion of the inhale and the contraction of the exhale? Notice how the body, How the breath is moving in your body. Notice the rising and falling of the chest, The ribcage and your belly as you're breathing in and out. And also notice whether this movement is big or small, Quick or slow, Maybe more to the surface of the body or maybe deeper inside of your body. So where in the body can you notice the breath and how does that feel? The movement big or small, Quick or slow, More superficial or deeper inside of your body. And start deepening the breath so you take a full inhale either through the mouth or the nose and you exhale fully either through the mouth or the nose. Keep on doing that. Keep on breathing in deeply, Maybe through the nose in and out through the mouth. Let it go. Go at your own pace. Breathe in deeply, Exhale fully. Keep on going. Notice the inhale. Notice the exhale. Make it as slow and deep as you can but still comfortable. So it could be something like this. You breathe in 4, 3, 2, 1 and you breathe out 4, 3, 2, 1. Breathe in 4, 3, 2, 1. Breathe out 4, 3, 2, 1. Find a pace that works for you. Quietly breathing in and out. Deepening the breath in the body, In the chest, Near the ribcage and in the belly. If you want, You can continue for a couple more minutes on your own or you let go of the focus on your breath. You can let go of the focus on your breath if you want to. Let it move again at its own pace. Let it move at its own pace. And then whenever you're ready, If you did close your eyes, You can open them again. And become aware again of the room or the space around you. Let in the light, The smells, The sounds, The temperature. And maybe sit still for a couple more minutes. Noticing the effect of the exercise that you just tried. And then I will meet you here soon again for more exercises linked to goodbye old, Hello new.