Welcome to your practice today.
For this somatic meditation journey,
My recommendation is to come to a comfortable lying down position,
The pose known as Shavasana in yoga.
Lying on your back with maybe a bolster or a pillow under your knees,
An eye pillow if you wish over your eyes,
And a blanket to cover yourself so you remain warm throughout this practice.
Prioritize your comfort today so you can sink deep into the sensations of your body.
As you begin to settle in,
Notice the support you're receiving from the floor beneath you,
Letting your weight sink with gravity towards the heart of the earth,
But aware of a gentle returning force,
A gift back from the earth that gently lifts every cell of your body towards the sky.
While you gift yourself to gravity,
To the earth,
The earth offers back a gift that lifts you back towards the sky.
Allow yourself to relax fully,
Whatever level of relaxation is available to you at this moment,
And become aware of the feeling of breathing in your body,
Letting go of the need to analyze or control it in any way.
Can you just sense your body breathing without you needing to do anything?
We will follow the breath and the oxygen it brings to our body now all the way to the subcellular level,
Sensing the oxygen-rich air at your nostrils first.
With the next inhale,
Follow the path of air into your body and continue to breathe naturally.
So throughout our journey,
Please maintain natural,
Effortless breathing,
Noticing the sensations you feel all along the way,
Sensation of air in the nasal passageways,
In the back of the mouth,
The throat,
A place in your throat where the air moves into the trachea and follows the trachea down towards the lungs,
Moving as if through a trunk of a tree,
Which branches first into the two bronchi and then branching further into bronchioles,
Smaller and smaller branches,
Until you feel the air,
The oxygen-rich air arriving in the deepest parts of the lungs,
Which we call the alveoli.
You can visualize the alveoli as the leaves of a tree at the end of all the little branches.
The alveoli have very thin membranes and are embraced in capillaries.
So sense or visualize now the oxygen diffusing from within the lungs,
From the alveoli,
Through the membrane and into the bloodstream,
Being received by your red blood cells.
And this oxygenated blood collects from the alveoli's capillary system,
Flowing into the heart.
And with the next heartbeat,
The oxygen-rich blood is distributed all around the body,
Coming in contact or close to all the cells of your body.
The blood first travels from the heart again through large vessels,
Branching out into smaller and smaller vessels,
Until once more it is flowing through tiny capillaries,
Near all the cells of your body.
And here the oxygen diffuses from the blood across the capillary wall and into the cells of your body.
Within the cells,
The path of the oxygen continues as it diffuses into organelles called the mitochondria,
Which are the power plants of your body.
Here energy is transformed with the help of oxygen into a form that can be used by your body.
We follow the path of oxygen which comes to the inner mitochondrial membrane now to participate in this transformative process of cellular respiration.
The oxygen is the last recipient of a high-energy electron that has gone through an electron transport chain here in the inner mitochondrial membrane.
Having accepted the electron,
The oxygen then combines with a proton to become water.
It itself transforms into water and joins the fluid that bathes the inside of your cells and the spaces between the cells of your body.
Feel that now.
Feel the whole journey of oxygen that has come from the outside of your body,
Through the lungs,
Through the bloodstream,
Into every cell,
Into the mitochondria,
To become the fluid that makes almost 80% of your body.
You might wonder,
What does this have to do with energy generation?
Returning back to that high-energy electron that the oxygen received at the inner mitochondrial membrane,
We could ask,
Where does this electron come from?
This electron was created during the transformation of food molecules,
Carbohydrates and fatty acids mainly,
In the mitochondria.
They were broken down by enzymes and the energy stored within the bonds of these carbohydrates and fatty acids was released and made available in the form of these high-energy electrons that then traveled through the electron transport chain on the mitochondrial inner membrane,
Creating a gradient of protons across the membrane.
And this gradient then drives an enzymatic process that creates ATP,
That energy that is usable by the cells of your body.
Take a moment to sense this.
And then you might wonder,
Well,
What about the exhalation?
What about the carbon dioxide that we exhale?
Where does that come from?
It is a waste product that is left behind when the energy is freed from those food molecules,
The carbohydrates,
The fatty acids,
When the bonds are broken and the energy freed from them and taken into the electron transport chain.
What remains behind in the end is carbon dioxide that the body can no longer use.
So carbon dioxide is generated within the mitochondria and it follows the opposite path to the path of oxygen through the body,
Diffusing first from the mitochondria into the cells and from the cells across the capillary walls back into the bloodstream.
And through the blood,
It is transported back to the heart.
And from the heart,
It is pumped back towards the lungs,
Where once more it comes in contact with the alveoli.
This time,
As the oxygen is diffusing from the lungs to the bloodstream,
The carbon dioxide is diffusing from the bloodstream and into the lungs.
As the lungs contract,
The carbon dioxide is expelled upwards through all the branches of the lung tree into the trunk,
The trachea,
Back into the nasal passageways and out through the nose,
A gift back to those beings that utilize carbon dioxide for the generation of their energy,
Namely the plants.
Let us return with our awareness back to the subcellular level,
Back to the mitochondria.
And I invite you to feel,
To sense the breathing process from here,
From the subcellular level.
Anchoring your awareness here,
Witness this wondrous process of energy transformation within yourselves.
And sense or visualize the breathing process free and effortless.
And sense or witness the energy transformation process free and effortless,
Making energy available to your body,
Energy that supports you as you move through your days,
Your vitality.
Hold silent space for you for about a minute as you remain witness to this wonder of life.
And you are welcome to remain resting here in the space of this experience for as long as you wish.
If you would like to close this practice together now,
Let your awareness expand a bit outwards and sense the breathing more globally,
Feeling the movement maybe in the belly,
Maybe in the ribs as you inhale and exhale,
As your body receives and releases the breath.
And then become aware of your legs,
Beginning to invite some movement into your toes,
Letting this energy that you cultivated through your practice begin to reanimate your body.
Awareness moving to the arms,
Bringing gentle movement to the fingers,
Coming to the head,
Maybe gently rolling the head side to side,
Just micro-movements,
A sense of reanimation,
Reawakening,
Supported by the cellular respiration that we were sensing.
And as the whole body begins to wake up,
Maybe bending your knees,
Bringing your knees to the chest,
Rocking the body gently side to side until you find yourself rolling all the way over to one side.
Resting here for three full breaths in awareness of your whole body,
In awareness of the cellular respiration that is always ongoing within every cell of your body.
And taking the palms to the floor,
Leaning into the palms,
Use your arms to lift your body up into a seated position,
Find your sitting bones.
And as we began,
Offer yourself to gravity,
Offer yourself to the earth,
And receive the gift of the reciprocal lift from the earth,
Lifting you through your central axis to the sky,
And balancing between this act of giving and receiving.
Let your eyes begin to open,
If they're not open already.
Soft gaze,
Taking in the space around you.
In time,
Allowing your eyes to begin to focus,
Start to look around the room,
Anchoring yourself within the physical space that you're in.
And when you feel ready,
Moving into your day.
Thank you very much for your practice.
Namaste.
