Hello my name is Matt Aubrey.
This is a recording of a Zoom meditation session that took place on the 13th of June 2020.
During the pandemic lockdown we were unable to meet as a group so we met on Saturday evenings via Zoom.
The following practice will contain a body scan,
An awareness meditation with an element of compassion work and then the session will end with an examine of the day.
So just allow yourself just to settle into your seated posture now.
Just allow yourself just to get comfortable and then take your awareness to your feet on the floor.
So just allow yourself just to feel that physical contact on the floor with your feet and then take your awareness then up to the chair or the bed or the cushion whatever you're using to support yourself.
Just notice the physical contact with the thighs,
The backside,
The lower back.
Just noticing that sensation there.
And then take your awareness then up onto your breath and notice the sounds around you.
The sounds you can hear inside of the room and outside of the room as you notice your breath and then we'll take two lovely breaths to settle us in.
So take a lovely breath in through the nose and sigh out.
And we do that again.
Lovely deep breath in and then sigh out.
Just allow yourself just to settle for a moment and just set an intention for yourself what you want this practice to be for you.
Maybe it's a time of just relaxing,
Time of stilling yourself,
Time of grounding yourself.
Just have a think about what you want this to be for you at this time.
And then we'll start our body scan.
So take your awareness to your feet on the floor.
Taking your awareness up onto your toes,
The top of the feet and the ankles.
Taking your awareness then up through the lower legs,
Knees,
The thighs,
The backside and the hips.
Just notice the physical sensations present there and then flow your awareness across up through the belly and the lower back.
Taking the awareness up onto the upper back and the chest and then take your awareness then up onto the shoulders,
The shoulder joints.
Taking the awareness across down through the upper arms,
The elbows,
The forearms,
The wrists,
The backs of your hands and the palms.
It's that little hollow there in the palm of the hand and then taking your awareness across onto your thumbs,
First fingers,
Second fingers,
Third fingers and fourth.
And then gently flow all the way back up through your arms from your fingers all the way up to the shoulder joints.
Just noticing what's physically present at this moment.
And then we take the awareness around onto the throat,
The back of the neck.
Taking awareness onto our jaw and our mouth.
Taking awareness to the lips,
The teeth,
The gums,
The insides of the cheeks and the roof of the mouth.
Taking the awareness onto the tongue and the space underneath the tongue.
And just notice the tastes and the physical sensations present there.
And then take your awareness up onto the nose and the nostrils.
Taking your awareness around onto the ears.
Bringing your awareness onto the eyelids,
The eyelashes and the eyeballs themselves.
Just noticing the physical sensations there.
And then flow your awareness then up onto the forehead,
The back of the head and up onto the crown.
And just take a moment just to notice what it feels like to be in your body,
In the space that you're in.
And then we're just starting to scan through our body as if we're being emptied out through the bottom of our feet.
So we scan all the way back from the top of the head all the way back down to the tips of the fingers and tips of the toes.
And just allow anything you want to let go of just to flow out of you at this time.
So if anything's been frustrating you or worrying you just picture it leaving now out through the bottom of the feet into the ground below you.
Just allowing the ground just to take it away.
And then in your own time when you're ready just allow yourself to be filled afresh all the way up through the body as if you've been filled with a new liquid or a new oil all the way up to the top of the head.
Just flowing as you go.
Now when you reach the top of the head just again take a bit of time just to notice what it feels like to be here now.
Just being present.
Nowhere to go at this moment.
Nothing to do and no one to be.
Nowhere to go.
Nothing to do.
No one to be.
And then when you hear the bell I'll start to guide us then in our awareness practice.
So to start our practice bring your awareness to your breath.
Just noticing the sensation of the breath flowing into the body.
Just noticing,
Just calming into you.
Noticing all the lovely movements of the breath coming in.
Movement in the ribs,
The chest,
Belly.
So just allow yourself to bring awareness to here first.
Just bringing awareness to that natural rhythm of your breath coming and going.
This is where we'll come back to through most of the practice,
This awareness of our breath.
Just allowing this to be the place that we'll hang out and settle into most of this practice.
You you And then when you're ready in your own time take your awareness then out from the breath just to the physical sensations present in your body at the moment.
So as I was saying at the start as we do this we we do with a sense of acceptance so we don't beat ourselves up if we feel intense anyway.
With this discomfort we just accept at this moment in time that is present.
As much as possible we do this with a sense of there's no judgment and we don't say whether it's bad or good it's just a physical sensation that we're bringing awareness to.
You and then when you're ready in your own time take your awareness away from the physical awareness of the body just back to your breath now just allowing yourself just to come and settle back with the rhythm of the breath.
Just allow yourself just to hang out here for a bit.
Just observing the physical sensation of your breath moving your body as it comes and goes.
Just allowing it to send to you then.
You you you and then when you're ready then bring your awareness away from the breath now just noticing what emotions are present.
So we're just noticing how we feel and again we do this without judging whether it's good or bad we just accepting these emotions are present and if anything difficult is present you notice any difficult emotions arising just we remind ourselves this is just a moment of suffering and we just encourage ourselves to be gentle to ourselves so we might even say things like may I be kind and gentle to myself so if emotions come up that we don't really like sitting with we just note them and just say those words to ourselves may I be kind and gentle to myself you you and then in your own time when you're ready just return your awareness then back to your breath the sensation of the breath and the body and this is where we're going to sort of hang out for a bit now again just notice the breath as it rolls in and rolls out your body bring awareness to all the little minute sensations of movement in the body you and if we find that we get in distracted quite a lot can we just allow ourselves to just come back to the breath that will sense of kindness or even maybe using that mantra again may I be kind and gentle to myself because as you think about it you are allowing this time for you which is good allowing yourself just to stop at this time for you you you you you you you you and then if you like there's the option and just to return again away from your observation of the breath and just to take your observation back to the physical body or taking your awareness to the emotions again or there's the option just to stay with watching the sensation of the breath coming and going you you again just to gently encourage you again to be kind and gentle to yourself as you explore the emotions explore your body but just doing that may I be kind and gentle to myself you you you you you and then just allow your awareness to come back to the breath again so if you've been off exploring your body or emotions allow yourself just come and settle back to the rhythm of your breath again certainly your awareness right at the essence of the breath as it starts as it starts to roll into your body it goes into fills into your lungs and your belly everything else starts to move with it just maintaining that awareness of the mystery of the breath really how this breath just comes in and goes out it keeps us going and also there's the option just to continue saying that mantra to yourself as well as you watch the breath that may I be kind and gentle to myself may I be kind and gentle to myself you you you you you you you begin by lighting a candle come home to yourself come home you lovingly welcome into your home the person that you are allow your hands to find rest and allow your hands to hold the weave from your day come home as we remember the day as it was remember a moment of light a moment of life and gently revisit it letting it live again in your mind's eye in particular taking in what it was about that situation that brought that sense of life be still be grateful as we remember the day as it was remember a moment that might have been frustrating or disappointing gently revisit this allowing it again to live in your mind's eye as well and if possible without judgment bringing that sense of kindness to yourself as you think through this moment be still be accepting and gently take the moment of life and light and the darker moment and allow them to be absorbed by the divine love within you bringing those situations to your heart center just allowing the divine love within you to take away those moments from your day be still be still and in the closing moments of our practice think of anything today where we might have done something where we need to make amends tomorrow maybe saying some words we wish we hadn't something happened that we need to say sorry for and that's obviously to do so would cause more problems gently just setting intention with yourself if you need to do that and then take your thoughts to tomorrow and what it is that you hope to do or things that you feel you need to get done just bring those things into your mind now and then we just release those trusting for our tomorrow as I gently blow out the candle just return your awareness then back to your breath so we return where we started the practice and just as we approach the end of our practice remind ourselves to have a sense of gratitude for the time that we've actually taken out for ourselves that we've actually done this to nurture ourselves and all the time that we do this we are learning and training the mind how to sit with whatever comes up just by gently practicing as we do so bring your awareness then to the sounds around you just noticing what sounds are present and then take your awareness to the sensation of the chair that supported you or the cushion or the bed so we're just noticing the physical sensations are being held and supported just noticing those places of contact and then gently bring your awareness to your feet on the floor just noticing the physical sensation of that firm floor that support us as we've practiced and then we'll take two breaths before we open our eyes to that lovely deep breath in through the nose and sigh out through the mouth and then we do that again lovely deep breath in and then gently open your eyes when you're ready
