I quiet and still my mind and enter into the sanctuary of the heart.
And in this place,
I just stop and I just allow myself just to be.
Just breathing.
Just noticing.
Just taking a few conscious breaths now.
Just noticing the rise and the fall of the breath,
The ebb and the flow of the breath.
Feeling this sensation of breathing,
This breath that breathes you.
Just allowing our awareness to focus on the rise and the fall of the breath.
And so right now there's nothing to do.
Just for right now,
Nothing to do,
Nothing to change,
Nothing to fix.
Just for right now we can let all that go.
And allow ourselves to be right here and right now in this exact moment.
Just stopping,
Just being,
Just breathing.
And so as we notice the rise and the fall of the breath,
We begin to notice our body sitting here or lying here.
In this moment,
As we feel the sensations of the body,
And just notice what the body is telling us in this moment without any judgment or criticism.
Just noticing,
Just being,
Just breathing,
Just allowing.
And so as we allow this breath to breathe us,
We begin to notice what is this present moment.
We become aware of this breath that is breathing us and the sensations of breathing.
And so as just stopping,
Just being,
Just breathing,
We begin to notice our thoughts that go through our mind.
We realize that in meditation it's not about stopping thinking.
It's simply about observing our thoughts as they float through our mind.
Just like clouds float by in the sky,
We don't judge the clouds as right or wrong,
Good or bad,
Success or failure.
We just notice them as they float by.
And so similarly we do this with our thoughts.
We begin to notice them as they float through our mind,
Whatever the thought is.
And so we don't judge the thoughts,
We just observe them.
We have these amazing intellects that can think,
That can remember,
That forecasts into the future.
And so we notice all this thinking of past and future,
Of goals and aspirations about the future,
And ideas and experiences of the past.
And as they arise in our mind we just notice them.
And so we find ourself off on some train of thinking about the future,
Some goal or aspiration,
Some fascinating idea that we come up with when we begin to stop for just a minute.
This imagination can get so creative.
And so that's all okay.
We just notice it and return to the breath.
Continuing to return to the breath over and over and over again,
Simply noticing the rise and the fall of the breath.
So we might be catching ourselves thinking about the future,
Some train of thought into the future,
Some doubt or fear about the future for ourself or for the world.
But just for right now we just notice all of that.
And we can label it future,
The train of thought when we catch ourselves and just return to the breath.
And so similarly when we begin to find ourselves observing ourselves thinking about the past,
Something that happened yesterday,
A week ago,
Ten years ago,
Whatever,
We just notice it and we label it past,
And we return to the breath.
Just breathing,
Just being.
Just being the observer,
Noticing the thoughts as they float through our mind.
And so we may notice our feelings,
Our emotional body now.
Our thoughts,
The tendency of our thoughts create our emotions.
So if we find ourselves feeling a sense of peace right now in the meditation,
Just allow ourselves to feel the peace,
Just to be the peace.
And sometimes in meditation we find ourselves feeling frustration or impatience or anxiousness.
If we notice these feelings,
We just notice them and we take a nice breath and just let it go and return to the present moment again.
Sometimes in meditation we may even feel anger or resentment for somebody we're having an issue with or some circumstance in our life.
This is all very normal in meditation.
These things arise when we stop.
And so the key is just to notice,
Just to notice all of that without making it wrong or right,
Without self-criticism.
Just noticing and returning to the breath,
The sanctuary of peace within our own self.
And so as we continue to return to the breath over and over and over again,
While being gentle,
Loving and kind to our self in the process,
We begin to notice the mind settling down,
A greater space between our thoughts.
And we align with an ancient wisdom,
An ancient,
Ancient peace that is already within us.
Just breathing,
Just being,
Just noticing.
