Foundations Of Mindfulness Meditation

A short mindfulness of the foundations of meditation. Includes a short body scan and guided practice through body, feelings, thoughts, and insight. Using the breath as your anchor we explore a peaceful inner space. For the benefit of all sentient beings.

Transcript

Welcome. Today we'll be doing a short meditation, Settling or familiarizing ourselves with our body, Our breath, Our thoughts, Our feelings. Taking a comfortable seated position or perhaps laying down or standing or walking. If you're sitting, Perhaps sitting on the cushion or sitting on a chair, Just starting to notice where you're making contact with the chair, Feet on the floor, Making contact with the earth. And we just start to notice our breath. Wherever your breath is at today, It's just right where it needs to be. Maybe you're noticing the breath at the tip of the nose, The back of the throat, Or deep in the lungs. Maybe noticing the abdomen rising and falling. And as we start to just tune into our experience here, Perhaps we're hearing sounds outside of ourselves, We can start to turn inward, Closing our eyes and just noticing the breath, Noticing the body. We'll do a short body scan to begin, Sending some relaxation and gratitude to our whole body, Starting with the feet and the legs. They do a lot of work for us walking us around, So relaxing the toes and the soles and arches of the feet, The heels, The ankles, Tops of the feet, The shins, The calves, The knees, The thighs. Relaxing both legs and just letting them go. And just coming back to the breath whenever your mind wanders. The mind wanders as it invariably does with thoughts. But just remember that thoughts are just like clouds in the sky. And our mind is that sky beyond the clouds, Clear and aware. So if we get caught up with a thought or a feeling or emotion, We can always use the awareness, The attention of the mind to bring that awareness, That attention back to anything. And right now we're just focusing on the breath and the body. So we just continue to relax the body, The feet, The legs, Relaxing the whole pelvic region, Relaxing the whole torso, Relaxing all the internal organs, Relaxing the stomach and the heart, Relaxing the shoulders, Shrugging the shoulders up to the ears and letting them go. Relaxing the upper arms and the elbows and the forearms, Relaxing the wrists, Maybe shaking out the hands if need be, Relaxing the fingers and thumbs. Just noticing the body and the breath. Relaxing the whole spine, Sitting upright but not uptight. Relaxing the low back, The lumbar where the spine curves in and then the mid to upper back where the thoracic spine curves out. And then relaxing the upper spine, The cervical spine where it curves back in and the neck makes contact with the skull. And just relaxing the whole body, Relaxing the breath, Just noticing what you notice. And as the mind wanders, As it invariably does with thoughts, Emotions, We can bring the attention of the mind back to the breath, Back to the body. Just continue to relax the back of the neck, The sides of the neck, The front of the neck, The throat, The tongue, The teeth, The jaw. Relaxing the eyes, The nose, And the ears, The temples. Relaxing the whole head and maybe even relaxing the scalp and the hair. And just sitting here, Breathing, Being, Returning our attention and our awareness back to the breath when our mind or thoughts wander. Start to just notice perhaps maybe a little bit of peace, A little bit of serenity starts to naturally come into focus. We notice the body, The heart beats, The body breathes, The mind thinks. That's just what it does. And we can sit here, Be here with the body, With the feelings, With the thoughts as they come and go, Like clouds in the sky. Sometimes the sky of the mind is cloudy, Or sometimes it's foggy, Or storming, Or snowing. Sometimes it's clear, But there's always the sky and the sunshine up above the clouds there, Beyond the thoughts, Beyond the emotions, Beyond the comings and goings. Any time we can turn the attention and the awareness of the mind back to its awareness of itself in this present moment. And even perhaps a moment beyond the present moment, Letting go of the past, Letting go of the future, Abiding in a fourth moment, Deep within us, A peace, A serenity, A natural being, Just breathing, Just being. Perhaps breathing in a short breath or a long breath, Breathing out that short breath or long breath. And if you need your mind to do something with the breath, You can try to make the out-breaths twice as long as the in-breaths. That'll naturally calm down the body and the mind and the breath. But otherwise, Just notice where your breath is today. Maybe you're breathing in a short breath, I don't know, Breathing out a short breath, Or breathing in a long breath, Or breathing out a long breath. Wherever your breath is today, It's just right where it needs to be. And if you can let go of controlling the breath and just noticing the breath, Letting the breath breathe the body, The body breathes, The mind thinks, The heart beats, That's just what they do. Just noticing, Just being, Just breathing. Taking a moment to let go of the past, Let go of the future, Even let go of the present and abide in a fourth moment beyond location and time. Noticing the breath and the body and the feelings and the thoughts, Allowing some space for some insight into this human condition, Open, Spacious and relaxed.