Welcome,
We offer these meditations freely and your donations make a real difference.
So thank you.
Welcome everyone,
Let's take some moments to settle into a comfortable position.
Be sure that you're warm and cosy,
That there's no strain in holding the position you're in.
So you can lie on your back if you need to,
Sit in a chair,
Down on the floor,
Trying to have a straight spine as much as is possible.
Of course the spine is never fully straight,
It already has a curve in it,
But a sense of lifting and lengthening in the spine is helpful to the practice.
You might take a moment to notice the parts of your body that are connecting to the floor or the seat.
Perhaps as you do that there's a tangible sense of dropping,
Allowing yourself to be held.
You might notice the sensation of the in-breath and the out-breath through the nose.
If the nose is blocked then just breathing gently through the mouth,
Teeth slightly apart,
Tongue resting up on the roof of your mouth.
You might notice an initial feeling state within your body,
So we're listening to texture and listening to a description of how it feels to be in your body today,
That being attached to what it should feel like and certainly not in any kind of idea of this is a good way to feel or this is a bad way to feel,
Which is coming honestly to what it is we find this morning.
For me,
When I know that I don't need to allocate it to a department,
I don't need to say this is a bad feeling or this is a good feeling,
There's an instant ease like I don't have to get to grips with it,
I can just allow it to be what it is.
It feels like a relief to me,
It's like the judgment itself is actually quite exhausting,
Having to decide if I'm happy with this or unhappy with this,
If I need to change this or if I need to hold on to this or do I need to reject this,
All of that is exhausting.
You might take a nice exhale to just recognize what it feels like to let go of all of that and just be with whatever you find.
You might slowly circle ahead,
Giving you the opportunity to notice sensation within the neck,
Perhaps switching direction,
Maybe those circles dropped out of shoulders.
You might move into elbows,
It depends on your space,
How tucked into blankets you are right now and then circling hard and then changing directions.
Perhaps you might find that the breath starts to deepen as you take the time to slowly circle,
Perhaps your hands want to circle,
Your fingers,
It's a very intuitive movement,
It's not needing to look a certain way,
Just acknowledging the bond between breath and movement,
How that feels with an undertone of kindness towards yourself.
Noticing how we might start to come to settling into stillness.
I'm going to take a practice that I've been learning at Karuna,
It's a focusing practice and we're going to bring that into RAIN,
So slightly different to our usual practice and let's just explore how that feels,
Open to whatever happens,
Whatever comes up,
One breath at a time.
So we begin this practice by clearing some mental space,
Some space within the field and just asking yourself,
How are you?
How are you this morning?
What lies between you and feeling well?
You don't need to answer,
You just let what comes into your body do the answering.
We don't need to catch hold of anything,
We're just going to see what arises,
Staying curious and whatever arises,
We don't have to dive into that,
We're just watching bubbles come up in a glass of fizzy water.
We don't need to really dissect each bubble,
We're just seeing the bubbles rise.
And just greet each concern that comes and you might put each concern into a little bottle,
An imaginary bottle and just put it on a shelf beside you.
So we take hold of whatever bubbles up each concern and just put it in a bottle on the shelf beside you and then ask yourself,
Except for that,
How are you?
What stands between you and being well?
Take each little or big concern and pop it in a bottle,
Just let it be on the side there next to you and ask again,
How are you?
What is between you and feeling well right now?
And then we come into feeling a sense of just one of those concerns that you popped into a bottle and we're going to just take one of those and we're not going to go into the problem,
We're just going to notice the sense of how that feels in your body when you recall that concern.
Sense the response in your body to that concern,
All of it,
The sense of the whole thing,
The murky discomfort or the unclear body sense of it.
You might start to explore how to get a handle on it,
What's the quality of that felt sense?
What one word or image or phrase comes from this felt sense?
Is there a word that would fit it best or an image?
You start to explore resonance around that felt sense.
So going back and forth between a word or an image and that felt sense and does it match,
Is it right?
And it evolves,
It's usually not a stationary thing so you can keep moving backwards and forwards between the felt sense and the word or the image and just notice if it feels like it resonates,
If there's a match or if things are changing and if there's changes then just follow those changes with your awareness.
Eventually sometimes we find a resonant match where the word or the image feels just right for the feeling.
Sometimes the feeling keeps changing,
The word keeps changing,
The imagery keeps changing,
Just stay with that,
Let the changes happen.
You don't have to pin anything down.
If you get the sense of resonance,
The match,
Let yourself feel that.
We're in the territory of recognizing and allowing.
We're allowing whatever a feeling is and we're investigating how that feeling is moving and changing or resonating with a word or an image.
And see if you can find the charge,
The little spark that makes this concern so alive.
What's the worst part of that feeling?
What's really so bad about it?
What does it need?
You don't have to answer those questions,
Just see what arises,
Wait for a feeling to stir,
Maybe there's an answer there.
What does this concern long for?
You might find that there's still much movement and change.
Let your awareness follow the path that the feeling state is taking you along.
Go back to resonating and finding a word or an image and then allowing this new sense of resonance to express what hurts,
What is needed,
What is being called for.
And we can bring some nourishment to meet the concern.
So that might be your future self arriving to provide whatever it is that is longed for.
It might be a place or a person.
It could be a friend or relative long since past.
It could be a deity,
Mother Nature.
It could just be future you coming back to this moment with all the love,
Maybe wrapping your arms around yourself and just holding yourself here,
Bringing the nurture,
The comfort and welcome what came up.
Be glad that it spoke to you.
The practice is just one step,
It's not the last.
It's just a moment to be with what is.
And now that you know what is there,
You can leave it or you can come back to it anytime.
Protect it and hold it with care from any voices of judgment.
And then sit back and just notice how your body is feeling.
And let's scan down through the throat,
The heart,
Perhaps into the belly,
The pelvis.
You might picture yourself bathing in light,
Maybe that light comes from right in the center of your heart,
Out through every cell of your body.
Bringing your hands to your heart,
Offering the fruits of our practice to all beings.
Namaste.
