A Meditation To Heal Queer Shame

Shame tells us we’re bad, broken, undesirable, or unloveable. Society has conditioned us to believe narratives like those about ourselves, but let this meditation be your antidote. Join Sah D’Simone to lovingly disentangle yourself from your shame and tap into your Queer power. Together, you’ll shift your perspective about your Queer experience, celebrate your innate glory, and offer the blessing of your gifts to the benefit of all beings.

Ready to heal your shame from the inside out, and learn to let your Queer joy shine bright?

Transcript

Hello my love and welcome to this Pride Empowerment Meditation.

My name is Sade Simone and it's truly such an honor and a joy to be your guide in this practice.

So to start,

I invite you to find a comfortable position.

You may be sitting on a chair.

Make sure that your feet are flat on the ground,

That your hands are resting somewhere that feels comfortable.

Or maybe you are sitting on a meditation cushion on the floor.

Or you're laying down.

Wherever position you find most comfortable for you,

Just make sure that there is intentionality and grace in your posture.

So take a moment now to center yourself into this beautiful meditation position.

You know,

If someone were to walk into a room and see you in this meditation posture,

That posture in itself will be a symbol of transformation for anyone who sees you in practice.

So position yourself like a beautiful symbol of liberation,

Of healing,

Of empowerment.

And when you find that you're settled into this practice,

I invite you to part your lips as if you had a straw hanging from your lips.

And we're going to sip the breath in through the mouth,

And we're going to exhale the breath through the nose.

Okay,

So all together,

Let's do this.

Sipping the breath in through the mouth.

And then out through the nose.

Into the mouth.

And then out through the nose.

In through the mouth.

One more sip here at the top.

And then out through the nose.

Breath in through the mouth.

Two sips here at the top.

Hold at the top for a moment.

Deep breath in through the mouth.

And then hold here for a moment.

Hold,

Holding,

And then out through the nose.

And then allow yourself to be a little bit more relaxed.

Hold,

Holding,

And then out through the nose.

And then allow the natural breathing rhythm to occur.

And just notice,

What is it like inside?

Has anything changed?

Scanning your internal world.

Noticing the quality of your presence.

Taking this opportunity to lower your gaze or close your eyes completely,

If that's in your practice.

And see if you can start to shift your mindfulness,

Your attention,

Towards your internal landscape.

And using your inner gaze for this practice.

So to begin,

I want to share a few things that I've been doing for the past few months.

So to begin,

I want to share a little bit about shame.

Because when we are not empowered in our queerness,

When we're not proud to be queer,

The narrative that's surfacing in our bodies and in our minds,

It's a feeling of shame.

Shame makes us feel like we're bad,

We're broken,

We're undesirable,

We're unloving,

Makes us feel like we are a mistake.

And unfortunately,

Our society has conditioned us to believe these narratives.

And as queer people,

We unfortunately have given our power to these narratives and not experienced our innate goodness.

And therefore,

We forgot to be proud of our queerness.

So through this practice,

We're going to begin to disentangle shame from our bodies and from our minds.

And we're going to slowly tap into our empowerment so we can become proud to be who we really are.

So now using your inner gaze,

I invite you to scan your body to see where do you feel shame in your body.

So taking this moment to activate the spotlight of awareness of your inner gaze and scan your whole body from the top of your head to the bottom of your feet and see where does shame live in your body.

And if at any moment during this practice,

Your attention wanders into sounds in the room that you're in or additional stories in your mind show up,

Just notice them and say,

Hello,

Distractions,

And come back to the practice.

Greet them with kindness.

So maybe by now,

You know where shame lives in your body.

And now what I would like you to do,

My dear,

Is give yourself a moment to reflect on your actions.

And I invite you to take a moment to reflect on your actions.

And now what I would like you to do,

My dear,

Is give,

Give it a color,

Give it a shape,

Give it a texture,

Bring your undivided attention to it.

Attention to it.

And for the next few moments,

I invite you to just witness it,

Be with it.

And now what I would like you to do,

My dear,

Is for you to channel your breath there.

You know,

You know,

You may be saying,

Son,

My breath won't go to the air of my body.

I understand,

But just be willing to just trust me on this one and see if you can just use the power of your imagination to channel the breath into that direction.

As you breathe in,

Visualize the breath touching that shape,

Touching that colored shape,

Texture that you're calling shame.

So spending the next few moments here,

Channeling the breath in that direction to that area,

Into that color,

That shape,

That texture,

To where you feel shame lives in your body,

Gathering all the energy of the mind,

Bringing the breath in that direction and breathing into it,

Breathing into it.

We're here for just another moment.

So keep channeling the breath right there.

Now I invite you to notice if anything has changed,

If the color has changed,

If the shape has changed,

If the texture has changed.

And if nothing changed,

That's okay,

My dear.

Now I invite you to take this a step further.

Now I invite you to take this a step further.

Let's talk to shame for a little bit.

Because what we resist,

It persists.

What we ignore,

Multiplies.

So let's take this moment right now to look at that color,

That shape,

That texture,

That place in our body where we feel shame.

Let's look at this feeling,

This shame,

And say,

Welcome shame.

Welcome shame.

I accept you.

And notice the resistance that you may have.

I'm just really trying to engage the power of your imagination here.

And repeating your mind and directing those inner words towards that feeling,

Saying,

Hello,

Shame.

I accept you.

Thank you for being part of my journey.

Thank you for being part of my journey.

So just spending another few moments here,

Just to let go of the past.

Whispering these words with your inner voice towards shame.

I accept you.

Thank you for being part of my journey.

And then let it go.

Let go of this visualization.

Let go of this part of the practice.

And now I invite you to listen to my words.

And if they resonate with you,

I invite you to just say to yourself,

I promise.

I promise to myself.

Or something like,

I'm willing to do this.

Or you may just nod your head,

Yes.

Or you may just nod your head,

Yes.

Whatever feels comfortable for you in this moment.

From this moment forward,

I make a promise to myself that any time I experience this feeling in my body that I call shame,

I will see it as an alarm for me to come back into the present moment.

And remind myself that I am innately good.

That my goodness is not circumstantial.

That I am worthy.

I am whole.

I am loving.

I am lovable.

And that I am so proud to be who I am.

So just take a moment now to just allow these words to move through your body and your mind.

And as I repeat them once again,

To see if you can bring conviction and trust into this statement by agreeing with it.

From this moment forward,

I make a promise to myself I make a promise to myself that any time I experience this feeling in my body that I call shame,

I will see it as an alarm for me to come back into the present moment.

And remind myself that I am innately good.

That my goodness is not circumstantial.

That I am worthy.

That I am whole.

That I am loving.

That I am lovable.

And that I am so proud to be who I am.

And now the last part of our practice,

I want you to take this moment right now to call up a memory in your mind of a time that you felt so happy and so proud to be queer.

So I'll give you a few silent moments right now for you to find that memory that brings you so much joy when you reflect on it.

You were so joyful to be queer.

So proud to be queer.

Proud to be queer.

Now connect with the feelings of being proud,

Joyful,

Courageous.

Of being just so joyful to be queer.

Connect with those feelings that are associated with that memory and turn them up.

See if you can turn the volume up on those feelings to the point that there's a smile coming up in your face that you feel giddy and your body posture,

Your body language just changes and you're like,

Yes,

Yes,

Yes.

Turn it up to that point that you find yourself uttering,

Yes.

Perhaps at least a,

You know,

A big smile shows up in your face or a big inner smile shows up in your mind.

Now give those feelings of joy,

Of being proud and courageous and excited and empowered to be queer.

Give those feelings a color.

And then see this color covering your entire inner world.

And as your,

As the blueprint of your inner world,

Of your whole inner sanctuary,

Of your whole body is flooded with this beautiful color.

I want you to visualize it growing wider than your body,

Wider than the room you're in,

Wider than the house you're in,

Wider than the street you're in.

Every time you say,

Yes,

I'm proud to be queer.

Yes,

I'm proud to be queer.

As you,

As you whisper these statements in your mind,

You visualize this,

This field of this light,

Of this color that is the symbol of these proud feelings,

Of these joyful feelings associated with you being empowered by your queerness.

You visualize this,

This light,

This color growing wider and wider.

And now it's taking over your entire street and it's taking over your entire neighborhood.

Your entire neighborhood is covered in that color,

Covered in that light.

And it's touching everyone all over your neighborhood,

All over your city,

All over your state,

All over your country.

And just keep visualizing it growing wider and wider and wider and covering the entire planet.

And visualizing this light,

This color emanating from your,

From your own body,

From the center of your being.

Visualize this color growing wider and wider and literally covering the entire planet.

Visualizing the entire planet covered in queer joy.

Keep visualizing,

Activate the power of your imagination and visualize the entire planet covered in this light,

Covered in this queer joy.

And everyone that's touched by this light,

Everyone that's touched by this color smiles and they're so grateful for your work.

They're so grateful for your healing.

So spend the next few moments here that I'm silent,

Moments here that I'm silent,

Just visualizing the whole planet covered in this light,

Covered in this queer joy.

And all people everywhere smiling as they're touched by this queer joy.

And if resistance arises,

Just try to say hello resistance and come back to the practice.

Good job,

My love.

Good.

And as we start to bring this practice into a close,

I invite you to just say hello.

Notice what is it like inside.

And then bring your hands in prayer in front of your heart if you like for the universal gesture of gratitude.

And just thank yourself for this practice.

And then slowly,

Slowly,

When you're ready,

You may blink your eyes open.

Thank you so much for practicing with me today.