Holding All Sensations in Awareness with Equanimity

In this meditation, Dr. Julien Lacaille guides you to develop the capacity to integrate pleasant, neutral, and unpleasant body sensations with equanimity.

Transcript

So finding our way into a lying posture for this one.

Noticing if we're holding any tension in the body and if it's possible to release any of that tension.

Just becoming more and more aware of your body kind of lying in the posture it's in right now.

Feeling the weight of the body.

Maybe feeling the body softening in certain places where there is tension,

Embracing,

Holding.

And slowly becoming aware of stillness.

Knowing that you can move if you want to move but experimenting with just being still.

And then bringing our attention to the belly or the chest.

Noticing breathing,

The movement of the belly.

If it's difficult to notice the movement of the belly you can take kind of bigger in-breaths and out-breaths.

Exaggerating the movement.

Replacing a hand and following the movement there.

And for the next few moments there's really nothing other to do than to just kind of bring and place our attention in that region of the body and just follow the movements.

From the beginning of the inhalations to the end and same with the exhalations.

We're gathering our attention,

Stabilizing attention and doing so in the body.

And we can picture if we want a balloon in that area of either the belly or the chest.

If her hand is there we can picture the balloon just right underneath her hand.

And we can imagine that with each in-breath we are expanding that balloon.

It's becoming progressively bigger and bigger.

Until it covers the whole body.

This balloon is a metaphor for our awareness.

So we're seeing if we can broaden our awareness and cover our whole body with our awareness.

From that point in the belly or the chest expanding with each in-breath until we become aware of the whole body just lying here breathing on its own.

Knowing we can always come back to that initial spot in the belly or in the chest if we want to as kind of an anchoring point.

And expand again if needed to be aware of the whole body.

And as you expand and invite you to go look for sensations in the body that have a pleasant feeling tone.

Something that's either slightly or very pleasant.

It could be the warm touch of your hand.

It could be the pressure underneath your body.

It could be some feeling of warmth or gentle touch of the air on your skin.

It could be a part of your body that's just feeling relaxed and good.

So as you broaden your awareness and you become aware of the whole body just scanning the different parts and just finding if anywhere even a subtle sensation that's slightly pleasant can be found.

And just staying with that sensation for a few moments.

Breathing with that sensation.

Seeing how it changes and evolves.

And then perhaps moving to another one,

Another place in the body that's feeling relatively pleasant.

Perhaps asking yourself where haven't I been yet in my body?

What haven't I noticed yet?

That's somewhat pleasant.

And then perhaps asking yourself where haven't I been yet in my body?

And letting these pleasant sensations recede to the background of your awareness now and seeing if you can bring to the forefront of your awareness neutral sensations.

Sensations that are neither pleasant nor unpleasant.

It could be some tingling in your legs or your arms.

One finger touching another.

Sensations in your ears or earlobes.

Something that we would not typically notice because it doesn't necessarily call our attention.

Seeing if we can notice those now.

And if you need to return to the belly from time to time to kind of recenter yourself and then expand out from the belly to the whole body to start scanning through the different parts and doing so from time to time.

And then seeing if you can bring back those pleasant sensations in the forefront of your awareness while keeping the neutral sensations there also.

So if it was the warm touch of the palm of your hand that was pleasant and the touch of one foot with the other that was neutral for example.

And being aware of both of those things at once holding both of those in the container of our awareness.

Pleasant and neutral sensations.

Co-occurring.

Seeing if you can kind of bring all those sensations together in your awareness in all the different parts of your body.

Gentle and pleasant.

And on the next out breath we'll let those recede in the background now and we'll switch to now unpleasant sensations in the body.

Those are typically the easiest to notice or become aware of.

Thinking for now if we can start with somewhat unpleasant sensations.

Could be tensions in the body,

Pain in the back or headache,

Could be an unpleasant emotion showing up in the chest or the throat,

Could be a feeling of agitation,

Frustration.

Seeing if we can go and locate those in the different parts of the body.

And again just kind of delicately placing the attention in that area of the body and with lots of curiosity and lots of kindness.

Just observing how they change from moment to moment.

Just breathing with those.

Once we spend some time observing non-judgmentally with kindness,

Curiosity,

We can switch to another area in the body where there's discomfort or unpleasant sensations.

And maybe progressively more unpleasant sensations.

See if it's possible really to turn toward,

To do what we don't tend to do.

To turn toward with a half smile,

With interest.

What does it actually feel like right now,

Right this moment?

Seeing we can always come back to just the breath at the belly region if it becomes overwhelming.

And then coming back to that region maybe or another one.

Seeing if we can really just concretely identify the different regions of the body that are experiencing unpleasant sensations right now.

If any.

And if the attention gets fixated or blocked on one,

Just asking yourself the question,

Where else might I experience some discomfort in the body?

And just as an interior explorer going to explore in the different parts of the body you haven't noticed yet.

Where haven't I looked yet?

I'll invite you now to see if you can kind of bring back to the forefront of your awareness the neutral and pleasant sensations that were there earlier.

See if they're still there now.

Might be the warmth of your hands.

Might be the feeling of your breathing.

The weight of your head on the cushion.

And the unpleasant sensations,

The tensions,

The pains,

The emotional discomfort.

Just to realize that it's all co-occurring.

It's all happening at the same time.

And maybe there's enough room in kind of the balloon of our awareness to hold all of those.

Maybe there's enough room in my awareness to experience unpleasant,

Neutral,

And pleasant sensations.

So just checking that out for yourself right now.

Seeing if you can include all of the sensations throughout the whole body with the whole range from unpleasant to pleasant.

All of it is part of your experience right now.

And the inquiry is,

Is it okay to be me with all my experiences right now?

Can I give myself that permission?

Just be me as is for now.

Holding it all in a wide open and compassionate awareness.

Just letting it be.

And then as we finish slowly coming back to the breath at the belly or at the chest,

For hands there,

Then coming back to the hand and the movement of the belly.

And then in our own time,

Opening our eyes and perhaps stretching.

Reviews

Very helpful. I’m going to pause during the day to briefly scan and let my awareness settle with equanimity. So appreciate this reminder.

Loved this. A different gentle way to inhabit the body. I’ll be repeating it often. Thank you. 🙏🏼

You are a wonderful teacher! itsa dream to work with you some day in real time. Thank you for your guidance.

With all what I have right now…may I allow my heart to be in peace and expand with compassion, allow my body to accept itself, allow my soul to flourish.
Thank you for this great intention setting meditation.

Wonderful to hold awareness of how unpleasant and pleasant sensations are continually arising and passing away in the body. Thank you

Great meditation. Well what I heard of it was. I fell asleep 10 mins in which is a good sign in a way as some meditations the voice would irritate me but I slept through till the end.

Absolutely fantastic. This is just so helpful.

Spectacular. An excellent way to begin the flow and tides of the day. Grateful.

This is a very skillful practice in developing capacity to recognize and hold all sensations (pleasant, neutral and unpleasant) with equanimity.

Absolutely amazing. Feel so relaxed and replenished. Thank you!!!!

Great for working on your own sensations. Definitely a must for improving your capacity to sit.

Very intelligently set up, highly effective meditation! Thank you!

Great practice! Thanks!

Great and inspirational way to broaden your awareness.

This was a good, if not slightly difficult exercise. It was soothing and it was calming and it does take a lot of focus to try to hold all these Sensations and recognize them without giving them too much emotion. This is the longest I have meditated so far in one sitting, and so I do think that I drifted off for a minute or so here and there but I will bookmark this and do it again. I actually like his talking through most of the exercise and meditation....I found it helped me to stay focused and helped my mind not to wander.

Great practice for awareness and acceptance. Thank you.

I found this to be very calming and helpful with rest, ease and pain release.

Very nice meditation helping to accept and make space for all the breadth of sensations and experiences at the same time and hold them in kind and gentle awareness.

Beautiful. Exactly! What I needed to hear the pain in the Now, mindfully, without soulnumbing drugs.
Hoorah!
Thanks.
Peace. Love. Light.

Very nice. Just what I needed.