Hello and welcome to this meditation on balancing yourself in the storm.
Whether you're facing difficulties at work,
In relationships,
Finances,
Or other areas of your life,
This meditation will help you as you navigate these difficult waters that you may be faced with at this time.
So go ahead and get comfortable.
You may do this meditation lying down or sitting down.
And as you settle in,
Let's go ahead and take a few deep breaths together.
Take a deep breath in.
And when you're ready,
You can just slowly breathe out.
See if you can breathe out all the way.
You might find it comfortable to pause at the top of the breath as you're breathing in.
And just hold that in breath for a moment,
And then gently release the breath.
Take another deep breath in.
And breathe out.
I'll invite you to let your breath be natural and just allow your body to breathe as it needs to breathe.
And let's turn our attention now to the body.
See if you can notice and bring awareness to different sensations in the body.
Do you notice where it's comfortable?
Do you notice where there's discomfort?
Where there's pain or other tightness?
Just bring your awareness to those different areas where it's pretty obvious that there's some energy there.
There's some discomfort.
Those are oftentimes the most easy things to spot.
Those are oftentimes the most easy things to spot.
The discomfort,
The pain,
The aches.
Do what you can to make yourself a little bit more comfortable.
See if you can relax maybe the shoulders or the arms or any other areas of the body that might be tense or tight.
See if you can take a moment just to relax those areas.
And as you're doing this,
See if you can shift your awareness to areas of the body where it actually feels comfortable,
Where it feels pleasant.
Maybe it feels safe in certain parts of your body.
Now let's go in a little closer to maybe the more subtle energy flows that are happening.
You might notice the pulse or other sensations that are happening inside your body.
See if you can notice those subtle rhythms and energy flows.
Might be guided to an area of the body that is looking for attention or needs that special attention right now.
And without judgment,
See if you can just be with these subtle sensations and just really fine-tuning and noticing that flow of energy or even maybe where energy seems to be stuck.
Just bringing more detailed,
Focused awareness on those very subtle,
Soft,
Or sharp sensory experiences.
Just bringing moment-to-moment awareness to the body.
You also might bring awareness to the thoughts or emotions that are coming up right now.
Not judging them,
But just being with them,
Being present,
Being witness to those different thoughts.
One way to help you not get swept away in the thoughts is to bring your awareness back to the body,
The sensations in the body.
You might even notice the emotional body as well in this process,
Noticing what emotions might be arising at this time.
And when I say the emotional body,
That might mean for you just noticing where in the body might you be feeling or experiencing certain emotions.
This might be where the emotions are arising from.
A certain area in the body,
Or these emotions might be passing through certain areas of the body,
The emotional body.
See if you can make contact and connection with the emotional body.
So now that we've taken some time to just tune in and sync up with these sensations in the body,
The thoughts,
The emotions,
The felt sensations,
We're now ready to move on to the next step of our meditation,
Which is being able to surrender and be with the difficult situation in your life at this time.
So you might bring to mind the trouble,
The difficulty,
Where it feels off balance,
Where you have resistance,
Or you feel like you're struggling.
Go ahead and bring that area to mind,
That situation to mind.
And as you do,
See if you can notice what emotions might come up,
What resistance you might be having to even facing this difficulty,
This challenge,
This obstacle.
And so please include not only the situation,
The circumstance,
But also include and notice your response to it,
Your resistance to it,
Your,
Perhaps your attitude towards it.
And also noticing if you have judgment for yourself or for other people within this context,
Within this difficulty.
So we're just bringing awareness to all the ways in which you might be judging or criticizing yourself or others,
Or the situation,
Resisting it.
And also,
Of course,
The emotions that are coming through as you face this difficulty.
Perhaps there is a sense of confusion or uncertainty.
If you don't know how exactly to move forward,
You don't see a way around this obstacle.
It feels very overwhelming.
So we're just bringing awareness to all of those different sensations,
Thoughts,
Beliefs,
Emotions.
And as you do,
See if you can notice what emotions might come up,
What resistance you might be having to those different sensations,
Thoughts,
Beliefs,
Emotions.
And see as you breathe,
If you can breathe in deeper and allow yourself to almost expand outward and be able to hold a bigger container for all the different emotions and thoughts that are coming up right now.
Imagine that you're taking the posture or the stance or the perspective of being witness to this situation and seeking with sincere heart,
With compassion,
To see all the different factors and facets of this circumstance.
So you're bringing that full awareness to all the different parts of you,
All the different parts of the situation,
As much as you can.
And in the surrender process,
What we're doing here is we're not pushing it away out of a sense of resistance,
But we're seeing it fully.
Seeing it fully,
We're recognizing the difficulties,
The challenge,
The emotions,
The doubts,
The fears,
All of these things.
We're bringing awareness to them.
And in that space of a sincere desire to be fully aware and fully present and fully nurturing,
As much as we have capacity to be kind to ourself,
To have compassion for ourselves,
And as much as we have an ability to clearly see what's happening within ourselves,
We can then surrender.
Not necessarily to this circumstance,
But the way I see it is to offer this difficulty and what's inside of us to maybe offer it to a higher power or to not collapse into it or shy away from it,
But it's almost perhaps to envelop it like a hug,
Like a loving embrace.
And the surrender,
You might imagine this,
Is to energetically or in your mind's eye to watch it dissolve.
Oftentimes when we're stuck and we have uncertainty how to move forward or the different fears,
Or the different fears,
Different strong emotions that are difficult to manage,
And the difficult circumstance itself,
Sometimes it can feel hard to move through,
It can feel like a brick wall perhaps.
So you might imagine something,
Maybe it is a brick wall,
Or allow your mind to allow this circumstance,
This difficulty,
To take shape.
Often for me,
I imagine some type of dark or black cube that I'm holding in my hands,
And I'm offering that up.
For you,
It might be something different.
It might be that brick wall or some other object.
Just allow your mind for a moment to channel and focus this difficult circumstance into some type of imaginary object in your mind.
And once you have visualized this,
Then go ahead and as the surrender process,
You can offer this up to a higher power,
Or you can visualize this dissolving away.
Perhaps you might envision a golden light coming down and washing over this object,
And washing it away,
Melting it away.
Or you might imagine the object breaking up into tiny particles and floating away and being dissolved.
So just notice what imagery comes to mind for you,
And just allow that object to be dissolved.
So now we might explore a question,
Who are you without this challenge?
One way to help you do this then is to remember that object that you had and you watched it dissolve or melt away.
You might,
In your mind's eye,
See yourself standing there or being in the space where that object has dissolved or melted away,
And now you might ask,
Who am I?
We're not so much seeking a specific answer here,
But I just invite you to be in the energy of awareness,
To tune in to the frequency of the present moment,
And simply becoming aware that there's more to life than the challenge that you have been facing,
Even though it might be very a difficult challenge if you have been obsessing about it,
And it's been something that you've just had to face.
That's totally fine,
And in this moment what I'm inviting you to do is simply take a breather and to recognize that there's more to you,
More to life than the difficult circumstance that you might be facing right now.
So we're simply bringing awareness to that space,
That essence of you that is bigger and beyond this present moment challenge that you're facing.
And who are you as you explore this?
And notice if this feels like a vulnerable place to be.
You might,
In this moment,
Be tapping into the vulnerabilities like a child would,
Who needs comfort and care.
So if you have that experience,
Go ahead and give yourself love,
Send love and compassion to yourself,
Send love to that inner child,
That inner being,
Or that space in you that might still feel afraid or uncertain.
So I'll invite you to take a deep breath in,
And as you breathe in,
Just breathe in love,
Compassion,
And on the out-breath,
Just release any remaining difficulty or strong emotions that you might be feeling in this moment.
And as well as you breathe in,
You might just breathe in love and compassion and a breath of fresh air to cleanse your body.
And as you breathe out,
Go ahead and breathe out any remaining residue,
Even of this meditation,
If it was difficult for you,
Just any energies that you need to release this time,
Just go ahead and breathe those out.
And finally,
I'll invite you now to just tune into your inner guidance system,
Tune into your inner guidance system,
And see if there's anything that comes to mind of what you feel drawn to do next,
Right after you finish this meditation today.
Maybe it's sleep,
Maybe it's doing some journaling,
Or other activity,
Just see if you can bring your awareness to what would be the most compassionate and kind thing to do for yourself next.
So as this is coming to mind,
You might also bring awareness to any judgment,
Or shame,
Or criticism you might have for wanting to do the thing that you feel inspired to do.
And if you do have any of that kind of thing,
It's okay.
You might not even know exactly what it is you need,
And that's also okay.
So I just want you to have compassion for secondary things,
For secondary thoughts,
And emotions,
And maybe judgments that might be coming up right now.
If you are uncertain on what to do next,
Maybe just take a moment to sit,
Even after this meditation,
Just breathe,
And just allow yourself to be present,
And stay in this meditative state as long as you need to.
And I also want to give you encouragement to,
If there was something that came to mind to do next,
Right after this meditation,
Don't hesitate.
Go ahead and do that thing,
And just take action on those little sparks of inspiration that come.
And finally,
As I close,
I'll just invite you to come back and revisit this practice again and again.
If you need support,
Just tuning in to the body and practicing some type of surrender.
That doesn't mean that all the difficult circumstances in our life are going to go away,
But the idea here that hopefully you've tapped into,
Is that we can sync up with our bodies,
Is that we can sync up with our bodies,
And we can energetically dissolve some of the difficulties that are happening within inside of us.
That we can take time to just be with the emotions and thoughts that are happening inside of us,
And that we can really come to that space of,
You might say,
Inner peace,
Or inner calm,
Or inner knowing on what to do next.
This is especially helpful when we're facing challenges,
And we might not see all the different steps that need to be taken in order for this challenge or obstacle to be resolved,
But we can,
In our mind's eye,
Energetically dissolve it and come back to present moment,
Come back to a place of maybe groundedness or somewhat more stability within ourselves.
And it doesn't have to be perfect.
You don't have to be perfectly calm or find perfect inner peace,
But just see if you can tap into those subtle energies of okayness,
Of safety,
Of love,
And compassion.
And also,
Hopefully,
You've tapped into a sense of clear seeing on what the next small step might be for you to do as you face this challenge.
So when you're ready,
You can take another deep breath in,
And move your body a little bit,
If you're ready to move your body,
And slowly open your eyes.
And again,
Stay here as long as you wish,
Or go and proceed and do the next thing that you feel inspired to do.
Thank you so much for joining me today.
