Who is Breathing?

A simple guided meditation on the breath that includes instruction on posture and psychology.

Transcript

Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Begin by feeling the stability of the posture.

Quiet legs.

Uplifted and buoyant spine and ribs.

Wide collarbones.

And a quiet mouth.

Notice what the tongue is doing.

And let the tongue have space.

Allow the lower jaw to soften on the exhale.

And on the inhale let the mouth receive the pattern of the inhale without the tongue needing to do anything.

Letting the ears be open in the same way the skin is open to the experience of being here in this room.

Feel the gentleness of breathing.

Effortless knowing.

Letting the breath come and go without effort.

Letting the breath form the background of the posture.

Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell Bell With the body alert and at ease allow the ears to open to sound.

With the breath in the background allow the ears to become receptive to sounds internally in the room and even beyond the room the ears are like microphones.

You you you you you you you you you allow sounds to come and go in the spaciousness of this body of this room of awareness and just like a microphone the ears don't chase after sound simply receiving all sounds as equal letting sound come and go in the spaciousness of listening.

You you you you with the breath in the background let the ears be receptive and notice how when sounds come through the ear the tendency is to label sounds images of what we think we hear.

See if it's possible to simply listen to sound with less language,

With less grammar.

Is it possible to hear sound without deciding about it?

Without going after them?

Can you hear sound without knowing,

Without much language?

Is it possible to listen without knowing,

So that every time the grasping tendency in our attention starts catching hold of images and thoughts,

We come back to the feeling of the breathing body,

We open the ears,

And we listen receptively.

Letting all kinds of sound simply move through awareness without knowing.

As the breath settles and the body becomes more and more quiet and alert,

Is it possible to listen without needing to know what comes next?

Without clinging to what has passed?

Letting the ears experience themselves,

Listening to sounds experiencing themselves.

Listening to the whole body breathing.

It's as if it's the breath doing the listening.

When listening becomes effortless and the body is listening,

It's hard to say who is doing the listening.

Perhaps you can ask yourself who is listening?

Who hears these sounds?

In the same way we can hear sounds coming and going.

In the same way the breath comes and goes.

Notice how everything of which we can be aware is changing.

Once you can hear sounds coming and going without chasing sounds or deciding about them,

Explore if the same thing can happen with breathing.

Breathing receptively.

Letting the body breathe without knowing.

Without knowing what comes next.

Letting the body breathe without adding anything to it.

Feeling the breath breathing itself.

The breath feeling itself breathing.

Who is breathing?

Who is breathing?

Who is listening?

Who is breathing?

And there's no need to answer these questions.

Just to meditate within them.

To become the question,

Who is listening?

Who is breathing?

Feeling breathing,

Feeling listening.

There is something universal about the breath and about sound.

The more we stay intimate with our breathing,

The less personal the breath becomes.

And likewise with thoughts and sounds.

Opening to sound,

To the body,

To breathing.

And asking,

Who is breathing?

Who is listening?

Receptive listening,

Receptive breathing,

Without knowing.

Reviews

Great Meditation. I will use it often.

Fabulous added to my bookmarks. Thank you for the stillness.

Great meditation to help with tinnitus!!! Thank you!!!!!!!

I enjoy this meditation and have returned to it many times.

Magnificent practice

Always beautiful 🙏

A really good guided meditation - plenty of silence to allow you to submerge yourself in the practice balanced with useful guidance and some food for thought! Namaste 🙏🙏

So peaceful. So much space. What a wonderful voice. Will be using this many times.
Thank you!

Some unique and powerful framing around listening and breathing.

Thank you Michael!

Thank you, dear Michael. May I listen without the need to know. Rest In Peace.

Thank you so Michael for all the things you did while you were here amongst us.
May you have found peace.
Namaste and big bows.

A great practice in letting go of words and images. Will definitely be returning to this meditation.

great meditation. but then, i like michael stone's meditations. we have been trained to label the mind's and body's activities: thinking, hearing, itching, tingling. sometimes this got tedious and easily seen as an an invitation to be more precise in labeling -- planning, fantasizing, analyzing. it is challenging to listen receptively without knowing but it is something very attractive to me. perhaps to get some respite from this overanalytical mind. will do daily. thank you!

Perfect everything.

Grounding and spacious. Love this practice!

Excellent pacing

Yes. That was really nice. Love the voice and words, but the space is best. Thank you.

I like the idea of being attentive to sound. That's a differemt approach to meditation for me but one to which I'll be returning.

"without knowing " a gamer changer in my meditation- Thanx