Hey,
Good evening.
It's Doug here.
Now recording these meditations,
I very much live in the world of sound.
I hear the trains in the distance,
I hear my neighbours walking up the stairs,
I hear foxes,
There's a scurry past,
Absolutely everything.
I can even hear people walking on the gravel nearby.
It's easy to take these sounds as a personal attack on my quest for silence.
Feelings of anger and frustration can begin to emerge.
I started to think maybe the problem isn't the lack of silence.
Maybe the problem is my desire for this perfect environment.
What if we could shift our perspective and instead of cursing every sound we hear,
We could learn to love those sounds?
Now maybe that's a bit too far,
But we could at least learn to accept them.
Now let's start by getting comfortable.
Get into whatever position is easiest for you to sleep.
At this point I often like to put one hand on my belly and one hand on my heart.
I find this comforting.
Now,
With you settled and comfortable in that beautiful warm bed of yours,
Let's go on a little sound adventure.
Start by listening to your own breath.
That gentle in and out.
Notice the difference the sound makes between the inhale and the exhale.
And notice how it sounds a little bit like ocean waves coming in.
And notice how it sounds a little bit like ocean waves coming in and out.
Just as you see a wave come into shore,
Travel up the beach,
Hold for a second and then recede back in to the ocean.
Now this is a great place to start.
It's worth making note that even in this moment we're making sound.
But instead of thinking about how the sound is generated,
I want you to think about how you feel the sound.
Where you feel the sound.
Try to go a little bit further than just the ears.
Try to go a little bit further than just the ears.
See if you can pinpoint where you feel and hear sound.
Now it's easy to see sound as either pleasurable or offensive.
Now it's either good or bad.
But when it comes down to it,
It's actually just sound.
It's vibrations.
And it's quite remarkable how it works.
In fact,
It's a miracle you can hear it all.
You see how sound works is an object,
A person or an animal,
Causes sound by making sound waves.
Those waves travel through the air and enter your ear.
They then vibrate your eardrum.
That in turn moves bones that vibrate the fluid in your cochlea.
This movement reacts with clusters of hairs and these hairs start to generate positively charged molecules called ions.
Those in turn cause chemicals to be produced and then are producedOr cause boiling or and those turn into electrical charge that travels down into your brain.
Now that's how you hear.
As you can see,
It's a remarkable process.
I want you now to see if you can feel each one of those elements with each sound you hear.
See if you can feel the sound coming into your ears.
Can you feel it vibrate your ear drums?
Can you feel the tiny bones in your ears move?
Can you feel the hair has been moved?
Can you feel that travel all its way into your brain?
Now if listening to sounds externally proves just to be far too troublesome and infuriating for you,
Then feel free to try out my other meditation,
Sound of Sleep 2,
Which will just be a collection of beautiful sounds and relaxing music for you to go to sleep to.
However,
If you're up for the challenge,
Join me now as we start to listen in to what you hear around you.
Now just let your mind's eye settle on whatever sound comes easiest to you.
If there's no sound in particular that stands out,
Then just go back to listening to your breath and try using that.
If you hear an external sound,
I just want you to resist the urge to think about it and what is making it and how inconsiderate it may be.
Instead,
Just focus on the sound's journey into your brain.
The actual act of listening.
See that sound as an opportunity to marvel at the true wonder that is your body.
You can give a level of gratitude to the sound as it comes in.
Really focus all your attention on it.
As you do so,
Focus on how it feels and where you can feel it in your body.
But also notice any changes that happen as you pay all your attention to it.
As you start to embrace this world of sound,
Can you get truly curious about the sound that you notice?
Resisting the urge to judge whether it's good or bad,
But rather just accepting it.
Great job.
Now,
Turn your attention to another sound that may become prevalent in your ears.
And repeat this process.
Hear the sound and then start to feel the sound.
Feel its journey into your brain.
And try pinpoint where you feel it and where you hear it.
And try pinpoint where you feel it and where you hear it.
Get curious about it.
Watch it change or develop.
And then start to initiate this feeling of gratitude towards it.
This gratitude to hear.
This opportunity to hear.
This gratitude to hear.
This opportunity to hear.
Now stay with the sound just as long as it's interesting to you.
Or as soon as another sound comes up,
You can just shift your focus to this new sound and repeat the process.
Always resisting this urge to be reactive.
Letting feelings of frustration or anger leave our body with the next exhale.
And letting the sound come into our body with the next inhale.
Free of judgement.
Just acceptance.
Not getting caught up in the story that causes the sound.
But rather just focusing on our experience.
Our experience of hearing.
Focusing on these different elements and mechanisms of our body turning these sound waves into actual sound.
Feeling the notes,
Feeling the vibrations.
Feeling the beauty that is to hear.
Once again if no sound presents itself,
Feel free to just go back to listening to your breath.
All the time maintaining calmness and acceptance.
As we go through this practice,
We start to embrace these sounds.
We embrace the imperfect world of sound.
We resist this urge to find this perfect environment,
This perfect silence.
And instead start to live in our experience,
Whatever it is.
Recultivate this feeling of unconditional love to our experience.
Not reliant on it being a certain way,
But rather taking it however it comes.
Learning that our reaction to the experience is what informs how we feel about it.
As we learn to accept this imperfect world of sound,
Maybe we can also learn to accept our imperfect selves.
Sleep well.
