The following practice is led by Sonia Lockyer,
Host of the Wellbeing Ritual Club.
Okay so good morning and it's mantra meditation today.
So things that you might want are beads if you like working with beads but you don't have to have beads and because it's meditation you want to have your spine straight so it's not unusual if you do a practice lying down to fall asleep so I recommend sitting up and that can be in a chair or on the floor whatever feels good to you if you are sitting on the floor try to elevate your hips higher than your knees.
For me that means four cushions stacked that's a lot of cushions so you don't go you know how many years have I done this and only used one cushion because somehow it felt like too much effort to get more cushions.
And now I have four it feels great.
So mantra meditation we've done many times before and I was listening to a really beautiful interview with a group of of tribal leaders from Canada and America people trying to reclaim their land and there was this mantra that was a universal mantra between all the different tribes and and actually having done their research on this mantra they'd found it in across the world in many hundreds of tribes and the word is.
.
.
Hang on I'm going to look it up so I don't say it wrong kamadi kamadi so that would be spelt k-o-m-a-d-i kamadi and it means variations on the same theme which is the heartbeat of mother earth kamadi the heartbeat of mother earth so whether you have mantra beads or not just letting the word kamadi roll around you this is new to me it was only this week that I heard this it's a trauma series that Gabor Mate has been running which has been really really helpful the wisdom of trauma and and it's one of his interviews kamadi the heartbeat of the earth so that's my suggestion for our mantra today so as we get ready to come into stillness get yourself comfortable let your spine stand tall find your pelvic floor to give you the strength to sit tall you can have your eyes open or you can have your eyes closed a mantra meditation is probably my favorite that it's not they're all my favorite but what I love is you can do a mantra meditation whilst you're chopping vegetables whilst you're in the office whilst you're driving probably not a good idea to do it in the bath in case you fall asleep but kamadi to just have that rolling around and sometimes it can be very cognitive and it's sort of rolling around in your brain other times it just drops into your body kamadi kamadi kamadi so let it do what it will do don't feel you have to contain it or give it a framework or an agenda just let it do what it will do your breath will regulate around that so eyes can be open or closed dropping right here to right shoulder we'll take some circles to ease up some space in the body before we get going right now I feel so lucky to be able to start my day like this with you guys what a lovely thing it is a magical space and a precious community thank you and then changing direction it always feels quite different time to time when we do the neck and watching you annually and obviously your neck hurts too much to do that how about doing the shoulder circles no if it hurts don't do it so and then maybe using the whole of your arms and doing the thing that feels good for your body and when it feels right dropping into heart circles there's an impulse in your body that will tell you the way to move sometimes it's hard to hear that impulse which is why we put structures in place to follow routines but these structures only exist they that they are the finger pointing at the moon so the the moon itself is the impulse the thing inside you that essence inside you that knows what's best for you right now maybe changing direction and all the practices and all the tools there the fingers pointing at the moon there's an expression don't get confused that the finger pointing at the moon is the thing that was only ever pointing you to the moon coming to rest in center so if you're working with the beads we start with the queen bead which is usually the biggest one sometimes there's a tassel on it and we say the mantra silently inside of us and each time we say it we pass a bead through our hands we're going to do this for 20 minutes that might be several circuits of a mala and by all means put the mala beads down and just let the heartbeat of mother earth come through you so so so so so keeping it gentle letting it flow the breath will organize itself around the mantra and if you should drift off down a rabbit hole you just bring yourself back with a smile more evidence that you're human so so Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Keep softening the face,
The shoulders.
Let the mantra do what the mantra will do.
We don't need to control it or contain it.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
10 more minutes.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Five more minutes.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Kamadi,
Kamadi,
Kamadi.
Final minute.
Final minute.
Letting the mantra go.
Softening into a smile.
Thank you to the leaders and the people that have come before us for sharing the mantra kamadi.
Thank you to the mantra itself for what it evokes and offering the fruit of our practice to all beings so that our personal well-being can be collective.
Namaste.
