Body Scan (MBSR) 20" | Week 1
The Body Scan is a mindfulness practice to cultivate awareness of the different parts of your body, allowing yourself to experience how each part feels, without trying to change anything. Practicing this meditation on regular basis may help you cope with stress, anxiety, and depression.
Transcript
Welcome to the body scan meditation.
We are going to go straight into it,
So come to lie down in a comfortable position.
And bring the arms alongside the body,
The palms facing upwards,
The legs slightly wider than hip width apart,
The heels touching the floor and the feet softly falling open.
Just take a moment to arrive here on the mat,
Maybe you still want to move a little bit the shoulders or the hips,
Making it comfortable for yourself,
Knowing that this is also time for yourself,
Time to nourish the mind and body.
No need to achieve anything,
No need to do anything,
Just a moment to be with your body and breath.
See if you can notice in what kind of state you are lying in here,
Thoughts that are on your mind,
Emotions or sensations in the body and then just noticing whatever is there without having to judge it,
Liking or destiking.
Just noticing and see if you can bring in some of the mindful attitudes such as kindness towards yourself,
Acceptance,
Non-judgment and in a bit we will move through the body with our awareness,
Bringing awareness to different body parts,
Sometimes narrowing our attention,
Sometimes widening,
To train the mind and to cultivate a sense of awareness for whatever is arising.
I would like to ask you to invite in some investigative curiosity,
Really investigating and observing with openness whatever is arising,
Whether these are sensations inside the body or whether these are sensations of the mind,
Thinking,
Noticing when the mind is wandering in thought and when the mind is wandering,
Just noticing this,
Acknowledging and then guiding yourself back to the practice in a friendly yet decisive way.
Just noticing whatever there is,
Whether it is pleasant or unpleasant or neutral.
That said,
Just bring your awareness to the body,
So feeling all parts of the body touching the mat,
The heels,
The weight of the heels touching the mat,
The calves,
The thighs,
The sit bones,
The back and shoulders,
The neck,
Really feeling your body lying on the mat.
From here,
Bringing your awareness to the breath,
The breath in the belly,
So feeling the belly rising on the inhale and falling on the exhale.
Without needing to change the breath,
Without needing to do anything,
Just observing the breath and the movement of the breath in the belly.
Now feeling the breath in the chest area,
Observing the chest rising and falling,
Maybe even noticing movement of the shoulders on the breath,
Noting if there is any muscles still tensed and then just allowing to relax these muscles.
Seeing the air coming in at the tip of the nose,
The coolness of the air coming in,
Filling up the body.
From there,
Gently guiding your awareness all the way down along the back,
Along the legs to the big toes,
To both of the big toes.
Just noting whatever is arising at the big toes in this moment,
Tingling or pressure,
Warmth or coolness,
Air moving around,
Just observing whatever you notice at the big toes.
And whenever you don't notice anything,
Just holding your awareness there.
That's also okay.
From the big toes,
Moving to the small toes,
Bringing your awareness to the small toes,
To the pinky toes.
And then to the other toes in the middle,
To the bottom of the feet.
And the foot as a whole,
So bringing your awareness to both feet as a whole,
From the inside out,
Surrounding your feet with awareness.
Your sensations are arising,
So even sensations of clothing,
The touch of clothing to the skin.
Bringing your attention to the heels,
The weight of the heels on the mat.
Moving to the ankles,
Surrounding your awareness,
Surrounding the ankles with awareness.
Bringing your attention to the calves,
Placing the body where we don't very often put our attention to,
Just observing the calves,
The touch with the mat,
The whole length from the ankle towards the knee.
Any tingling or tension or pressure.
Moving to the shins,
The long bony parts,
Following all the length of the shins with your awareness,
The outside,
The inside.
Moving to the knees,
The top of the knee,
The bony part.
And all the ligaments and tendons to the sides.
And the lower part of the knee.
Maybe you notice that your mind is wandering off in a story or thinking and then just noting this thinking,
Thinking and coming back to the present moment,
To the part of the body that we're focusing on,
Which is in this moment the lower part of the knee.
All your attention to the part,
The lower part of the knee.
Moving up towards the thighs,
The big muscles of the thighs,
The top of the thighs,
The quads.
The sides,
Inside this thigh.
And the hamstrings running along the back.
Maybe you notice a difference between right and left and just noting this and then coming back to the practice without getting lost into story or thinking.
Just noting and with a friendly yet decisive manner or attitude,
Bringing yourself back to the practice.
At this point at the back of the thighs,
Just softening awareness and attention.
Being relaxed yet alert.
Coming up to the hips.
Relaxing the hips.
From the hips moving to the pelvic area,
Bringing all your attention to the pelvic area,
Noticing whatever sensations are arising here.
If you don't notice any sensations,
That's also okay.
Just holding your awareness by the pelvic area.
Moving along the sides to the back to the sit bones,
Feeling the weight of the sit bones on the mat.
Notice if you feel any sensations there.
Warmth,
Coolness,
Pressure.
Releasing the tension of the sit bones moving to the lower back,
A place where we so often hold tension and see how your lower back is in this moment.
Maybe even you feel a slight gap between your body and the mat in this area by the back.
Bringing your attention to the shoulders.
Checking if you find any tension in the body somewhere.
Sometimes habitually we re-tense our body,
So see if you can re-relax if this has happened.
Bringing your attention back to the shoulders,
The upper back.
Moving down along the back again and over the sides to the front,
So to the belly.
And feeling the belly moving on the breath.
Actually from the inside out,
Any tension or gurgling sounds even.
Bringing the awareness up to the chest and then all the way along the arms to the hands.
Feeling the fingers.
Observing any sensations arising by the fingers.
Focusing tension,
Warmth or coolness or maybe even the air touching the fingers.
Bringing your awareness to the hands as a whole.
Moving to the lower arm,
Feeling the lower arm on the mat.
Moving to the upper arm all the way to the neck.
Surrounding the neck with the tension,
The throat area,
The jaw.
Noticing if the jaw is soft and relaxed.
Maybe even allowing the mouth to drop slightly open.
Feeling the mouth on the inside,
The tongue.
Moving your attention to the nose,
The tip of the nose where the air moves into the body.
Moving to the eyes,
Allowing the eyes to be relaxed in your socket.
See if there are any sensations you can notice by the eyes.
Moving to the eyebrows,
The back of the head,
Feeling the weight of the back of the head on the mat.
From here feeling the whole body.
See if you can breathe in through the top of the head and breathe out through the feet.
Breathing in through the feet and breathing out through the top of the head.
And breathing in through the feet,
Breathing out through the top of the head and doing this a few times at your own pace.
Getting along the whole body.
Slowly whenever you're ready start to bring some movement into the fingers and the toes.
Maybe bringing the arms up and overhead,
Stretching yourself up,
Extending and flexing the feet.
Saying yes and no with the head.
Coming up slowly into a seated position.
And then I say thank you and I hope you enjoyed this meditation.
