Relax Your Brain - Free Your Thoughts (01-10-21)

Do your thoughts get in the way of your meditation, relaxation or sleep? Learn how to make problematic thoughts a thing of the past with this simple mindfulness of breath and thoughts meditation that will leave your body and brain totally relaxed and release mental tension, stress and anxiety and encourage insight and inspiration. (Audio quality improved - March 2021.)

Transcript

The approach to this meditation I'd like to invite you to take is whenever we're taking our attention to something is not to think you need to concentrate or focus on that thing to the exclusion of other things.

So I'd like to invite you to,

As much as you can,

Maintain a light and open awareness.

So seeing your awareness as welcoming experience into an open space and your awareness is wide enough and big enough to accommodate any experience that happens within this meditation.

To begin with,

I'd like you to take a particular interest in your breath.

So if you can gently hold the breath in the centre or the foreground of your awareness and allow everything else that you're also aware of,

So thoughts,

Feelings,

Other sensations and sounds,

Any distractions,

Any thoughts on any topic,

Just allow those just to continue as they are.

Don't try and exclude them or block them from your awareness.

See if you can just allow them to be slightly in the background and bringing the breath into the centre,

Into the foreground of your awareness.

So I'll give you a few moments to just explore that idea and that experience of keeping the awareness nice and open,

A welcoming open space and see if you can allow the breath to be in the centre of that space.

I find it most useful to really explore the physical sensations of the breath in the body.

So I don't want it to be just a mental exercise of thinking about the breath.

I want to really see if I can feel the breath in the body,

Feel those sensations in the body as I breathe in and explore all the sensations that are there as I breathe out,

Really feeling the breath,

Enjoying the breath.

Aware of sounds and thoughts and other sensations and feelings,

Taking a particular interest in the experience and sensations of the breath in the body,

Exploring exactly how it feels as I breathe in and out,

Connecting to the breath,

To the body,

To the present moment.

So an important aspect when we move on to the thoughts in a few moments is to not try and change the thoughts in any way.

So let's just practice that now with the breath.

So being aware that I could change my breath if I wanted to,

I could choose to breathe more slowly or more deeply or count the breath.

But instead,

I'm going to just allow the breath to breathe as it is,

Actively engaged with the breath through my awareness and attention,

But not changing the breath in any way,

Giving the breath all the space it needs within my awareness to rise and fall within the body just as much as it wants to,

No more,

No less.

So I feel that the body is receiving the breath,

Allowing the breath into the body and fully letting go of the breath with the out breath.

So not restricting the body,

Not restricting the breath in the body and not holding on to the breath,

Allowing it to leave the body as fully and as freely as it wants to.

So allowing the breath in,

Letting go as you breathe out,

Just checking that you're not getting in the way of the breath.

See if you can get a sense of the body being breathed.

So the breath is doing all the work.

You don't have to make any effort at all for the breath,

Aware of the breath,

Allowing the breath,

And the body being breathed by the breath.

Allowing thoughts,

Sounds and other sensations to accompany the breath.

Simply inviting the breath to be in the centre and the foreground and allowing everything else of this moment to happen around the breath.

Now let's see if we can apply these same principles of awareness to our own thoughts.

So we're going to allow the breath to just gently,

Slightly move into the background along with other sensations and feelings and sounds.

And gently bring the thoughts from the background into the centre,

Into the foreground of our awareness.

So the thoughts become the thing that we're most interested in and we allow everything else to happen just around the thoughts,

Just in the background.

And again so that it's not just a mental exercise,

With the breath the invitation was to really feel the physical sensations of the breath.

So with the thoughts I'd like to invite you to notice how the experience is different to be thinking with awareness compared to how we normally think without this awareness.

We don't normally hold our thoughts under the light of our awareness in this way.

So it is a different experience and we can feel that experience and feel how different it is to our normal everyday experience.

So let's spend a few moments becoming familiar with this new experience of thinking with this awareness,

With this interest.

Remembering not to concentrate or focus but keep the awareness nice and open,

Light,

Gentle,

Welcoming space of awareness,

Holding the thoughts gently within the space of your awareness.

Allowing everything else in this moment to be happening just around the thoughts.

So how does that feel?

Because we're so often so closely identified with our thoughts this may feel a little strange to begin with or a little difficult so just give it time and keep it simple.

All we're doing is being aware that we're thinking.

It's that simple.

The temptation to want to interact and engage and change or direct your thoughts can be quite strong compared to when we're just being aware of the breath.

See if you can,

Although we're showing interest in our thoughts in the sense of paying our thoughts attention and holding them in the centre of our awareness,

Be completely disinterested in the content of your thoughts.

So it really doesn't matter for this meditation whether your thoughts are positive or negative,

Fast or slow,

Deep or shallow,

Logical or random.

This space of your awareness is big enough,

Wide enough,

Strong enough to welcome and accept and hold within it any thought at all.

There's no thought that isn't welcome.

I choose not to try and change any thought,

To try and stop any thought.

I consciously and deliberately welcome any thought to come within my open awareness.

I give my thoughts complete freedom to do whatever they want to do.

Maintaining a disinterest in the content of those thoughts.

No need to engage with them at all,

Just allow them to be as they are.

And to help if you find yourself running away with a particular train of thoughts.

Keeping that awareness open,

So as well as the thoughts,

See if you can also still be aware of your environment,

Sounds and breath.

See if you can notice that while these thoughts arise in your mind,

The breath continues to rise and fall within the body.

Noticing that I'm thinking and breathing.

I can maintain a presence,

I can remain in this moment,

No matter what the thoughts are.

As around my awareness of my thoughts,

I notice the breath and sounds.

Keeping the awareness light and open.

The idea being that by giving my thoughts complete freedom,

And not by trying to change or stop any thoughts,

And I'm not adding any tension to the mind,

Any conflict.

And I'm not wasting any energy or engaging with any particular thought.

By giving my thoughts this complete freedom and this open space of my welcoming awareness.

Then gradually in time,

I may find that they begin to slow and calm down.

I may become more positive,

More intuitive,

More inspiring,

But I don't try and create those thoughts,

And I don't try and get rid of any other types of thoughts.

I'm just being open to noticing if in time there is a change to the thoughts.

Without any pressure,

Without any expectation.

As I practice this open awareness,

It becomes less important what those thoughts are.

Even if they are negative in any way,

They have less power and less impact.

So I have less need or desire to have to change my thoughts.

I can have the patience,

The strength,

To just allow the thoughts to adjust in their own time.

If the body is tense or tired,

We can't force it to become relaxed,

Can't force it to not be tired.

But we can put the body in an environment,

In a position where we can give it the time and space it needs to gradually release tension and gradually recover from tiredness.

So we are doing the same for our mind and for our thoughts,

We are giving them that space and that time within our open awareness to recover and sort themselves out in their own time.

Remembering to just add the breath into your awareness as well,

Maybe bring the breath more into the centre with the thoughts if you find yourself running away with the thoughts.

Adding the breath to your awareness just ensures that you are nice and grounded in the body and connected to the present moment.

And it doesn't matter what the thoughts are,

If you are aware of your breath,

If you are aware of your thoughts,

You can only think in the present moment.

And if you are in the present moment,

You are doing all that you need to do,

Regardless of the content of the thoughts,

They are really not important.

I am simply noticing that I am thinking and that I am breathing and these are both happening right now in this moment.

And I hold the awareness of this moment,

The awareness of breath and thoughts in my open welcoming awareness.

Without expectation and with unlimited patience.

We will start to bring the meditation to a close by first just checking the body,

See if you can allow the body to completely relax.

Notice any tension you may be holding onto in any muscles,

Just having a quick scan through the body.

And as you release any tension in the body,

Just notice how that can really allow the breath to flow more freely through the body.

The more relaxed the body becomes,

The easier it is to be present with the body.

Feel the breath flowing freely through your relaxed and present body.

Free flowing breath through your relaxed body.

Now let's apply the same idea of flow and relaxation to the brain and the thoughts.

So approaching your brain just as you would any other part of the body,

Allow your brain to completely relax.

Allowing your whole head,

Face and brain to totally relax.

And the more we allow the head,

Face and brain to deeply relax,

The easier it becomes to be present with the thoughts and to allow the thoughts to flow freely through the mind.

Just as the breath flows freely through a relaxed body.

So allowing the brain,

Head and face to become more and more relaxed.

Allow your thoughts to flow freely through your relaxed brain,

Through your relaxed mind,

Through your open awareness.

For the last few moments,

Really enjoy the simplicity of being in this present moment,

Really enjoying the flow of breath and the flow of your thoughts through your relaxed body,

Your relaxed brain.

And keeping the awareness light and still.

And keeping the awareness light and open.

And open to receiving any insights,

Any new thoughts,

Any inspirations or intuitions.

You just need to give the mind the space and the time,

The flow and the freedom to allow intuition and inspiration to arise naturally in the mind.

With patience and without expectation.

OK.

So we'll bring the meditation to a close there.

Reviews

Very calming, relaxing and peaceful meditation to start my day. It has grounded me gently through my self-awareness and to see my day through. 🙏☀️