Allow yourself to arrive in whatever way your body is capable of arriving today.
You do not have to drop into stillness.
You do not have to feel comfortable.
You do not have to trust the room or the moment or even your breath.
You are not failing if your chest feels tight or if part of you is waiting for something to go wrong.
Simply come as you are.
A system that has survived things you never should have had to survive.
A body that has learned vigilance as instinct.
A heart that has been startled awake more times than it has been soothed to sleep.
Find a shape that your body can tolerate.
If lying down feels too vulnerable,
You are welcome to prop yourself up,
Tuck a pillow,
Bend your knees,
Place something over your belly.
Anything that gives your system a sense of containment.
Your only job is to be here in whatever way is accessible.
If it feels even slightly safe,
Soften the gaze or allow the eyes to close.
Allow the room to dim in the same way that dusk gathers slowly without rushing the day to end.
Let the edges of your awareness soften like a landscape losing its sharpness as night approaches.
Feel the weight of the body being pulled by gravity,
Not in a dramatic way,
Just in a gentle,
Steady tug.
As if the earth is saying,
You don't have to hold yourself up right now,
I've got you.
Let the back of your head rest as if it were a stone settling into sand.
Let your shoulders be caught by the surface beneath you,
Like tired wings folding for the first time in years.
Let the arms rest like river branches laid down after a storm.
Let the pelvis feel held.
Let the legs be heavy.
Let the heels anchor into the earth the way roots sink even in uncertain soil.
Nothing in you has to be calm.
Calm is not the goal today.
Presence is the goal,
And presence can exist alongside fear.
Begin to feel each breath,
Not to control it,
Not to deepen it,
But to simply notice how it's moving in a body that has known danger.
The inhale might feel shallow,
Broken,
Hesitant.
The exhale might feel unfinished,
As if it doesn't trust the world enough to fully let go.
This is not wrong.
This is what survival has taught your lungs.
Allow yourself to meet the breath exactly as it is,
The way you would meet a small,
Wild animal.
Not reaching for it,
Not forcing it to come closer,
Simply witnessing its existence with reverence and respect.
With each inhale,
Imagine cool air brushing across the inside of the ribs like a breeze moving through tall grass.
And with each exhale,
Imagine warmth spreading across the chest,
Like the last golden streaks of sunlight sliding behind the horizon.
If parts of the body brace,
If the jaw tightens,
The belly pulls in,
The shoulders lift,
Simply notice the bracing without needing to stop it.
Your body is doing exactly what it has learned to do to protect you.
You are not undoing that protection.
We are offering it a moment to rest.
Begin to imagine your body as a landscape shaped by weather.
Some places are blasted by wind.
Some places dried into hard clay.
Some places are cracked wide open.
Some places are lush.
Some are completely untouched.
You don't need to change the landscape.
You just need to walk it gently.
Bring awareness to the right hand,
Noticing the knuckles like small river stones.
The palm,
Is it warm or cool?
Each finger is like a branch grown in different directions.
Awareness drifts up the wrist,
That fragile hinge that is held more than its share.
Up the forearm,
A long corridor of memory and muscle.
Into the elbow,
Which is a pivot into the upper arm,
A quiet field,
And the shoulder is a harbor for lingering storms.
Moving to the left hand,
Allow it to be different.
Left-sided vigilance is common.
Left-sided numbness is common.
Left-sided absence is common.
Nothing needs to be even or symmetrical.
Trace that awareness up the arm,
Through the shoulder,
Across the collarbone,
Into the neck,
A funnel where fear often collects,
Tightening the passage between the body and the mind.
Let awareness soften into the face,
The jaw that grips,
The mouth that learned to stay quiet,
The eyes that learned to continuously scan,
The forehead holding the imprints of years of anticipation.
Now breathe into the throat,
That narrow canyon carved by words swallowed,
Truth withheld,
Screams,
Never given voice.
Drop awareness into the chest,
The internal weather system.
Notice the atmosphere here,
Stormy or still,
Open or armored,
Dense or hollow,
Perhaps none of these,
Perhaps all of these.
Whatever you find is correct,
Move into the belly,
The deep instinctive animal of the body.
Notice if it is pulling back,
Pushing forward,
Trying to disappear,
Trying to take up space.
Notice how it rises and falls like a shoreline,
Breathing the tide.
Bring awareness into the pelvis,
A place of memory,
Power,
Closed doors and deep,
Deep wisdom.
This place holds so much that the thinking cannot reach.
Down through the legs,
Thighs,
Strong like tree trunks that have survived drought,
Knees that have bent under pressure,
Calves carrying stories silently.
The ankles are small but resilient,
Feet are ancient,
Feet are wise.
Feet are tired from running from ghosts.
Let the whole body be held in one continuous field of awareness as if the entire landscape were stretched out under a slow moving night sky.
And gently begin to invite sensation,
Not intensity,
Sensation.
Imagine heaviness not as a burden but as the earth reclaiming you,
A soft gravitational embrace.
Allow heaviness to gather in the limbs,
In the pelvis,
In the chest and breathe with it.
And now invite lightness,
A small lift behind the heart,
A breath rising a little higher,
A subtle brightness in the cheeks or the collarbones.
The lightness of a single firefly blinking in the dark.
Heaviness returning.
Lightness returning.
Heaviness returning.
Lightness returning.
Heaviness.
Lightness.
Your emotional body is learning movement,
Learning that it can hold duality,
Learning that safety is an absence of feeling,
It is the capacity to feel without breaking.
Invite in ease,
Not joy,
Not pleasure,
Simply ease,
A softness that spreads like mist across a morning field.
And then invite tension,
That familiar feeling of muscles bracing,
The instinct to protect at all costs.
Tension.
Tension.
Ease.
Tension.
Ease.
Tension.
So you don't have to force anything,
You are teaching your system that emotions can shift without triggering danger.
Return to the breath.
Let it wash through you like a slow tide,
Every inhale is a cool breeze brushing across the landscape of the ribs and every exhale is a warm settling in the belly.
Imagine in your mind a scene,
Not a vivid one,
Just a sense.
Perhaps a forest at dusk,
Tall pines against a cobalt sky,
The ground soft with fallen needles,
The air is cool but not cold,
It is quiet,
It is still,
It is safe enough.
And allow yourself to rest in this forest as if your system recognizes the steadiness of trees that have weathered storms without full collapse.
Feel the trunks rising around you like guardians.
Feel the earth beneath you warming your back.
Feel the cool air brushing your skin the way a calm night brushes the river's surface.
And then imagine a soft diffused light,
Not bright,
Not intense,
Just a gentle glow like moonlight blurred by the fog or the glow of embers behind the fire's last breath.
Allow this light to drift across your body,
Over the crown of the head,
Down the forehead,
Over the eyes,
Into the jaw,
Softening gently everything it touches.
Let it move down the throat,
Melting the tightness that has been waiting decades for permission to let go.
Across the chest,
Warming the vineyard of your lungs,
The orchards of the heart,
The soil of old wounds and new growth.
Down the arms where defense has lived for far too long,
Where protection has become automatic,
Where instinct built fortresses.
Let the light soften the belly,
The diaphragm,
The deep bowl of the pelvis.
Imagine fascia unwinding slowly,
Like rope loosening after years of strain,
Not snapping,
Just softening.
Let the light travel down the thighs,
Over the knees,
Down the legs,
Into the soles of the feet.
Feel the entire body illuminated in soft and steady warmth,
Not heat,
Not intensity,
Simply presence.
And then imagine you are sinking into the earth,
Exactly one inch,
Not disappearing,
Not falling,
Settling a small amount deeper.
It's as if the earth is saying,
You can rest here,
I will not let go.
Allow the thoughts to become distant,
Like fog rolling across a dark lake.
Let sensation blur,
Let the edges of the body soften.
Notice the boundary between you and the world dissolving into gentleness.
Descend into the layer of your consciousness where your system may reorganize the place beneath alertness,
Beneath language,
Beneath vigilance.
You may drift,
You may blur,
You may float or sink or hover,
All of it is safe in this moment.
And now begin to return not upward,
But outward,
Like a tide sliding back towards a shore,
Like dawn warming the horizon after a long night.
Feel the breath growing more pronounced,
Feel the weight of your body returning,
Feel the room slowly re-entering your awareness,
Wiggle your fingers and your toes.
Let small movements reawaken your edges,
Roll gently to one side,
Pause in the shape of this new beginning,
Fetal,
Curled,
Protected.
When you are ready,
Begin to rise slowly,
Rise as though a tree was awakening at dawn with the roots and then the trunk and then the crown.
Sitting upright,
We allow the breath to settle in the ribs,
Allow the spine to rise and allow the shoulders to rest.
Taking one final inhale through the nose,
Slow and steady,
Followed by a long,
Soft exhale through the mouth.
Notice,
Notice if anything has changed,
Even if it is subtle,
Even just the smallest amount of pocket space within the body.
This is enough.
You are enough.
Our practice is now complete.
