From Shampinyada,
I'm Colleen Thomas.
This is Everyday Magic for Ukraine.
Today we ground into stillness.
Welcome to The Circle.
Welcome to Everyday Magic for Ukraine,
Where we honor Ukraine and we also practice a bit of self care to stay strong as allies.
If you're new here,
Welcome.
I'm so glad you've joined us.
So the only item we need today is a kind of space and time that allows you to go into stillness.
So whatever you think will best facilitate that,
That works within your day,
That works within your now,
Move into that space.
I'm going to be saying less today to give us more time to be in the stillness,
To ground into that stillness.
But before we get there,
I want to speak about how to do this in a trauma sensitive way.
A lot of times when we go to meditation class,
We are told to find the breath,
Focus on the breath,
Follow the breath as it comes in and leaves our body.
And honestly,
It's a methodology that can be challenging if you've been experiencing any arousal in the nervous system.
So my invitation to you is to see if you can find something that feels truly good to you while we sit.
Now this could totally be staying with your breath.
It could also be noticing the felt sense of sitting on or standing on or lying on whatever you are upon,
Feeling your weight sinking into that item.
It could be looking around your space,
Noticing what you see.
It could be just listening,
Just deeply listening to however many things you hear in your environment.
And there's no requirement to have your eyes closed.
The invitation is always to do whatever makes you feel good and safe and okay.
Also know that sometimes with meditation,
While we are sitting and we have our focus on the moment and we are using whatever anchor to be present,
Sometimes there can be activity in the nervous system,
A kind of reactivity or an activation or something that brings stuff up.
Basically when we are living our daily lives,
We're busy and we can keep distracted from whatever is going on in the heart,
Whatever's going on in our nervous system.
But sometimes when we sit still,
It shows up.
So in this space,
If anything shows up for you,
I really want to encourage you to move with it.
If you might,
For example,
Feel a need to run,
If a kind of a fear thing happens in your body for you,
Maybe you don't even know why,
See if you can do that.
Can you?
Is it safe for you?
Is it practical for you to just get up and run somewhere,
Run across the room,
Run back,
Run back and forth across the room?
Just let your body do what your body needs to do.
So those were a lot of words and I invite you to just let them go and begin to become aware of where you are and decide what anchor you would like to use.
For our meditation,
We will be practicing grounding into stillness together.
So let's just sit together for three minutes.
And so finding whatever anchor you'd like to use,
Just go ahead and begin your focus on stillness.
So how was your experience of grounding into stillness?
What did you notice?
Did your body give you information?
Was it easy to sit still and be in stillness?
Was it difficult?
And how do you feel different now than you did before we started?
Just noticing completely without judgment,
Just with total support and understanding and love of yourself.
If you're someone who meditates often,
This might have been a walk in the park.
And if not,
This might have been a new adventure.
Either way,
I'm really glad you're with us.
We're going to begin to transition now out of our meditation.
Again,
I am so grateful to you for sitting with me in stillness.
May we always remember how precious and important and wise our bodies are and how much information they will give us as we sit together.
May it be so.
Thank you so much for being with us today.
Your presence,
Your energy,
And your heart make all the difference in healing our world.
Remember to breathe today.
Breathe and expand.
And I hope you join us again next time.
Please consider inviting a friend.
