Welcoming Presence: Settling The Nervous System

Healing is to be able to embrace every part of ourselves with curiosity and gentle-ness. When our nervous systems become regulated, we can welcome ourselves back home into a sense of belonging. Belonging with ourselves, others, the natural world. This short talk introduces "Transforming Presence" where we begin to support the nervous system so that we can respond to life compassionately instead of live in a state of overwhelm and reactivity. After the short talk is a simple yet deeply nourishing practice that invites us into the present moment in a trauma informed and gentle way.

Transcript

Welcome,

Welcome.

I'm so glad that you're here.

We're just arriving together,

Getting settled in,

Maybe taking a few full breaths to arrive.

Allow your body to rest into support and feel the surface beneath you that you're sitting on,

That you're lying on.

You could even be standing and feeling the earth beneath your feet.

And today I'll do a little bit of talking just to introduce some themes and our practice and then we will have plenty of time to sink into practice today.

No matter where you are in the world,

How you're feeling today,

What parts of you are here with us,

Welcome.

Welcome,

Welcome,

Welcome.

This practice is around nervous system regulation.

And I had a friend of mine ask me last night,

So what do you really mean when you say regulation?

What is nervous system regulation?

Is that balance?

And he also asked me,

What is healing?

And all of us could answer this in so many ways,

Right?

And if you're here today,

I'm guessing you are in a healing process and that you're either curious about nervous system regulation or you already know that it's an incredible key to support you in your own healing process.

I describe healing as embracing,

As welcoming ourselves home,

Welcoming each other home,

So that every single part of us can belong.

There is a way that when we have experienced stress or trauma,

That parts of ourselves get pushed away or ignored or we numb out to.

And so as we're in this healing process,

We're not just trying to feel great all the time and in a positive mood.

We're welcoming every part of ourselves so that we can feel fully expressed in our humanness.

Pleasant,

Unpleasant,

Everything in between.

And be able to be with ourselves in a compassionate,

Kind,

And embodied way.

But be with each other,

Be with the earth and all that's going on in the world in the grand scheme.

There's so much going on right now and in each of our own lives.

And so when we can be in that state of welcoming,

When every part is welcome,

When every part belongs here,

We have space to embrace it.

Even the ones that we maybe tend to want to push away,

There's still space for that too.

And regulation supports that.

Regulation could be looked at as something simple like being in balance.

I look at it as being able to respond instead of react.

Having enough space to be right here in the present moment and meeting each moment with our hearts wholeheartedly,

With our minds able to respond appropriately,

And our bodies being able to be here with it all.

Many of us have lived in a state of fight,

Flight,

Freeze,

Collapse,

Fawn,

Or all sorts of different states we go into for survival for a really good reason.

And so when we become regulated,

We don't need to be in those states anymore to keep ourselves safe enough.

We just trust that we will respond or react when we need to instead of staying in a constant state of reactivity.

When we're regulated,

We feel safe enough to really be here and meet the moment as it is wholeheartedly and in a connected way.

We can be steady.

So I love these nervous system regulation practices that are built on the idea,

Experience,

Of what we call co-regulation.

We're practicing in community.

I'm here with you intentionally supporting our nervous systems as a community to come into regulation.

We work with the parts of the body and the nervous system that jump to react when they don't feel safe enough or when they haven't felt.

So this practice might be a little bit different than what you've experienced before.

We're going to work with the adrenals.

If you've practiced mindfulness before,

It's actually quite similar.

In mindfulness,

We pay attention to the breath a lot of times.

And in this practice,

We'll be paying attention to our adrenals in a very gentle,

Very kind way today.

And as we support them,

We're giving them space to come into the present moment.

Much of the time,

Our adrenals are the first to jump into action when we've experienced stressful events in our life.

And so as we bring support there,

They become nourished and full and able to really be supportive of our experience right here and right now and help us know that in this moment,

I hope that we are safe enough and that we are okay and that we can rest into support and take up nourishment,

Be in connection,

Be in relationships,

All sorts of things.

Before we move into the practice,

If you haven't already,

Go ahead and allow yourself to find a posture,

A way of being,

A way of resting into support today that feels comfortable enough for your body.

We'll be practicing for about 20 minutes.

It can be sitting,

It can be standing,

Lying down.

Take a moment and check in with yourself,

Your body,

And see what feels best today.

During the practice,

You can move if your body wants to move,

You can make sounds.

This isn't a experience of making ourselves push into discomfort,

Push past pain.

We really get to embrace all that's here and tend to it with care.

As we settle into this present moment together,

Let's go ahead and just take a few fuller breaths,

Allowing each inhale to call us even more fully into this present moment.

Each exhale allows us to sink,

Settle,

Melt more fully into the support beneath us.

We can even feel down through the structures of whatever it is that we're resting on,

Down through the building if we're in a building,

And into the support of the earth.

For this practice,

You're welcome to have your eyes open or closed,

Whatever feels most supportive for being right here and now today.

If you like,

You can place a hand on your heart and maybe a hand on your belly,

And we'll take a moment to set an intention for our practice today.

Intention is so powerful for our healing and growth.

What would you love to have happen today in this practice and beyond?

And for some of us,

It may be very simple.

It might be something like,

I just like to feel a little bit of ease today.

For others,

It might be,

I'm open to experience the possibility of healing in the highest ways possible for myself.

You get to set intentions in whatever way feels fun for you today and interesting,

Supportive.

And then you can allow that intention to go into the background.

I will begin by reminding all of your parts,

Every part of you,

That they are welcome here.

Parts that feel hard to be with,

Parts that feel easy to be with.

True freedom is being able to welcome it all back into our hearts,

Coming into a new relationship with it.

We can really take our time with that.

Let's bring our intention to your right adrenal.

And if this is a new practice for you,

You can bring a little smile with it,

Going,

Why?

I don't know.

And maybe just open to getting curious.

And when I say place our intention with the right adrenal,

It's just a soft,

Kind presence.

Our adrenals are located in the mid to lower back,

Just beneath that bottom rib.

We can simply say hello to this right adrenal today together.

We don't even need to get the location perfectly.

And as we say hello to your right adrenal,

We can welcome everything that comes along with it.

Sensations,

Thoughts,

Emotions,

Busy mind,

Checking in,

Checking out.

It's all welcome.

And you might be interested to know that this right adrenal is shaped like a pyramid,

Resting on top of your kidney.

And as we're resting our intention here together,

We can be open to all the possibilities of healing.

Less is more.

As we're in our processes of healing,

And sometimes these practices can be so simple it can seem silly.

And we just get to see what happens together,

Staying curious.

And we're here supporting your right adrenal as it rests on top of your kidney.

Whatever comes up,

Comes up.

It's all welcome.

And if anything becomes uncomfortable,

We can ask ourselves,

Can I allow myself to be with this?

And if it becomes overwhelming or painful,

Then we back off.

We don't push into discomfort or pain here.

There's plenty of time and space.

I'm still resting our intention with your right adrenal.

And then we can float gently away from your right adrenal and bring our intention across now to your left adrenal.

This left adrenal located just beneath your bottom rib in the mid to lower back,

Resting on top of your kidney.

We don't need to get the location perfectly.

Our intention is more than enough.

Just a gentle,

Kind,

Warm presence when we have it available.

Yeah,

Saying hello to this left adrenal and welcoming everything that comes along with it.

Emotions,

Thoughts,

Sensations.

And this left adrenal is shaped like a half moon resting on top of your kidney.

Plenty of space here,

Plenty of time for every part of you.

Yeah,

Resting our intention here with your left adrenal,

Allowing it to rest into support.

And if there's noise in the mind or the body,

That's welcome.

That gets to be here too.

It makes sense that it's here.

Left adrenal,

Still open to all the possibilities of healing.

And then we can rest for a couple of minutes here in a healing silence.

I'm just letting the body integrate this work.

Nothing to do,

Nowhere to go,

No one to be.

We're just here together.

And as you feel ready,

You can shift and take your time.

I'm bringing with you into your day or evening any part of this that feels supportive.

You might allow a word to come to mind or a phrase that anchors you to this experience so you can carry it with you.

And while we're here,

If it feels resonant for you,

We can send any wishes out into our communities,

Into the world,

Families,

Friends,

Into the little animals,

Nature,

Whatever your heart feels moved to.

Any goodness from this practice that we've gathered together today,

We can send it out into the world,

Letting it land there.

It's so good to be here with you all in practice.

May you all have a gentle,

Easeful day or evening.

Thank you so much for your practice and I look forward to seeing you soon.