The following meditation is a guided attentional focus practice.
So to begin,
I would invite you to find a comfortable posture,
Either sitting or lying down that you can be both alert,
Awake and relaxed.
And as you settle into this posture,
You can just allow your eyes to soften and maybe hold a soft gaze just at the floor in front of your feet if you're sitting,
Or just allowing the eyes to relax and soften if you're lying down.
Or if it is comfortable,
You can close your eyes for this meditation.
Whatever feels right for you in this session.
And as you relax,
Settle in,
We'll allow the sound of three bells to begin this meditation,
Just allowing our hearing to follow the bells coming into this present moment as fully as possible.
And as the sound of the bells fade away,
I would invite you now to bring your full attention to the seated or lying down posture.
So we begin with mindfulness of posture.
And maybe starting at your feet.
And if your feet are making contact with the ground,
Just noticing the felt sense,
The sensation of pressure,
Contact.
And just allowing awareness to move up the body,
Noticing the position of the body seated or lying down.
Sensing into the places that make contact with the surface beneath you.
Perhaps noticing the sensation of being supported,
Grounded.
And we further come into the experience of being present,
The body seated or lying down here.
Just inviting the mind to come here as well.
And for this meditation,
We'll be choosing an anchor,
An anchor that we can continue to come back to,
To bring our awareness to.
And this anchor can either be in the body or in the environment.
So if it's in the body,
You may choose the breath to serve as the anchor of attention.
Or perhaps you choose the place that the bottoms of your feet make contact with the ground.
This can be an anchor to bring attention back to.
Or perhaps the hands.
Each time the mind wanders off bringing attention back to the hands.
Or if the body is not a particular comfortable place right now,
You might choose something in the environment.
Something like sound.
Just letting the soundscape be the anchor of awareness.
Any of these are aspects of the present moment that you can continue to touch into as we proceed in this meditation.
So go ahead and make your choice now,
The breath,
A part of the body,
Or sound in the environment.
And it's good if it's possible once you choose your abic just to stay with that through the meditation.
So continuing to settle into a relaxed and awake relationship with the anchor that you've chosen.
So just receiving the breath or receiving a body sensation or the sounds in the soundscape.
Just noticing how your object arises and can be known.
And inevitably the mind has most likely begun to wander.
Perhaps wandering off to the future,
Wondering what's next,
Planning something that hasn't yet happened,
Or perhaps worrying,
Worrying about something that isn't right here.
Or maybe the mind has wandered back to the past,
Remembering something,
A task that you haven't completed or a regret.
This is very normal for the mind to wander.
In fact,
This is just what the human mind does.
And that's what we're doing here.
We're noticing when the mind wanders off,
And we're gently bringing it back to the present moment by bringing it back to our anchor,
To the breath or to the body or to sound.
We just do this over and over.
This is the training of the mind.
And it's possible to begin to see this as an opportunity,
An opportunity to notice that the mind is no longer here in the present and to gently invite it back to the anchor over and over.
This is the practice.
Is that clear?
And it's not uncommon to find the mind wandering off into judgment.
Judgment of self or judgment of the experience.
Thoughts arise like,
I'm not doing this right,
Or I hate this,
Or I wish this were different.
Some sort of critique on the experience or the self.
And if any kind of judgment arises during this meditation,
The instruction is just to notice this without adding to it,
Without adding additional judgment,
And come back to the anchor.
Come back to the present moment of actually just being here,
Sensing the breath moving in and out,
Or sensing the body sensations at the hands or the feet,
Or listening and hearing the sounds in the soundscape.
That's the practice.
And as we practice meditation,
All of us discover just how squirrelly the mind can be,
Always leaving the present moment,
Jumping around,
Shifting into the future or the past,
Or getting caught up in some sort of commentary or judgment.
Instead of simply being present to the life that's here,
This breath,
This body,
The sounds,
The present moment itself.
So you might just check in now and ask,
Where is my mind?
Where is the mind right now?
And if it's not present,
Not right here,
Just invite it back over and over,
Returning to the anchor.
This is the training of the mind to be present to the life that's here,
The only life we have that's happening right here.
And you might also take a moment just to notice how the experience is for you right now.
Is it pleasant?
Is it unpleasant?
Or perhaps it's just neutral,
Neither pleasant or unpleasant.
So just check in right now.
How is it?
And whatever feeling tone is present for you right now,
Just see if instead of reacting to it,
Trying to get away from what's unpleasant,
Or wanting to hold on to what feels pleasant,
Just relax the body,
Relax the mind,
And let it be however it is right now.
Whatever's arising,
Just let it be as it is.
Maintaining awareness helps us see that whatever is here is going to change.
There'll be a new moment,
A new sensation,
A new feeling tone.
And as we learn to just stay steady,
We can watch these arise and pass away.
Arise and pass away.
Cultivating presence,
Developing non-reactivity,
Just letting this moment be as it is,
Continuing to come back to the anchor over and over.
Just this breath,
Just this body sensation,
Just this sound,
Not adding anything to it,
Just letting it be just as it is.
And learning to rest in this calm awareness present to the life that's here.
