This meditation was recorded at One-Minded Dharma in Petaluma,
California.
We're going to do a concentration practice today,
Using the breath as our object of awareness.
So you can begin by allowing the eyes to close.
If it's more comfortable for you,
You can leave them open at a soft gaze on the floor.
And you can take a moment here to tune into where the body is at,
How it feels to actually be sitting where you are in this moment.
Noticing the points of contact where the feet are on the floor or tucked up underneath you.
The contact with the chair or cushion.
The hands,
Perhaps resting in the lap on the knees.
Maybe you can feel the sensation of the clothes on the body,
Or the temperature of the air on the skin.
Bringing your awareness to this actual experience you're having in the body right now.
Perhaps you can get a felt sense of the outline of the body and how it's resting.
You can notice the movement in the body as the body breathes.
In the stomach and abdomen,
The rising and falling.
The chest from the center around to the sides of the rib cage.
The filling and emptying,
The expansion and contraction of the lungs as the body breathes.
You don't need to breathe in any certain way.
Allowing the body to do the breathing and simply resting the awareness on the experience in the chest.
Maybe you can feel a sensation in the shoulders,
Arising and falling.
At the nostrils,
The inhale tickling ever so slightly and as you exhale coming out just a little bit warmer.
You can pick one spot in the body where you can feel the body breathing.
You can always investigate a different spot in a different sitting period,
But for now just sticking with one spot.
As you rest your awareness here,
You don't need to push out any thoughts that arise.
You don't need to deny any other experiences present.
Rather resting in awareness of the body breathing and leaving the other things be.
Allowing them to come and go,
To arise and pass and staying with the body breathing.
Seeing if you can be with this breath right in front of you from the beginning of the inhale all the way through the end of the exhale.
It may help to use a counting exercise as you inhale and then exhale just counting one.
Inhale and exhale counting two.
And just continuing like this to eight and starting back at one.
Using the numbers not as a competition or contest,
But as an aid to help you stay concentrated where you are with the breath.
If you lose count,
Find yourself going up into nine,
Ten or eleven.
Can always come back to one.
Every time we notice the mind wander and come back to one,
We're strengthening our ability to be mindful and to cultivate a concentrated mind.
Trying to bring your awareness back to this one breath in front of you over and over again.
When you find the mind wandering,
You don't need to judge yourself too harshly or beat yourself up.
Instead,
You can bring some joy that you've noticed the mind was wandering and come back to the breath.
It's in these moments that we're cultivating this ability to focus,
To collect the mind onto the breath.
And to have mindfulness of when the mind is wandering.
So treating it as an opportunity rather than an obstacle.
Gently bringing our awareness back to the breath,
Starting back at one.
And letting go of any self-criticism,
Judgment.
What does it feel like to be breathing in this moment?
For more information,
Visit www.
Mooji.
Org For more information,
Visit www.
Mooji.
Org
