Welcome and thank you for joining me tonight.
You are joining me on my balcony in Medellin,
Columbia.
You might can hear the background noise.
So just take a moment and just join me here in Columbia with your mind's eye.
What you imagine that it might look like or feel like or sound like.
Begin tonight's practice just by letting the breath out that you've been holding in all day followed by a big deep cleansing breath filling up your lungs and your belly and letting that out.
Another day over,
Another day finished,
Another day that you have lived and walked through.
I invite you to take a moment just to reflect back upon your day.
What really worked for you?
What didn't?
What are you really glad about?
What do you wish would have happened?
Just take a moment and reflect.
And with that reflection,
Future pace yourself into tomorrow.
What would you like to do different?
What do you need to do different so that this time tomorrow night you were sitting with a little bit more peace in your heart about the end of another day?
Because it will come,
It will end,
The day will pass and you have one opportunity to live it or walk through it to its fullest.
So just take a moment and future pace yourself into tomorrow.
How do you want to wake up?
What do you need to do to settle yourself into your day?
How do you want to feel at the end of tomorrow,
Tomorrow night sitting in the same place?
How do you want to feel?
What do you want to look back upon and appreciate?
And now having the opportunity to have reflected in the past on your day today and future pace yourself into tomorrow,
I invite you now to just come into the now,
Into this moment where there is no past and there is no future.
It's just right now.
Dropping into the moment that is right in front of you that's happening as we speak.
This moment that you are gathered together sitting in stillness.
Noticing your body breathing for you and just taking a moment not to do anything but just to enjoy the simplicity of simply breathing and listening,
Listening to what is around you and just noticing,
Just observing,
Quietly watching,
Listening,
Hearing and breathing.
Doing nothing more but those two things.
Okay.
Being aware if the ease of your mind flows to the next thought or the next idea.
It's not a problem at all.
It's just simply awareness that that does happen and bringing it back to just what you're hearing and what you're noticing and listening to right now and not riding on the train of the thought that takes off.
But just imagining yourself just getting off the train easily and calmly and coming back to the sounds that are around you.
You might hear my neighbor and their music playing.
You might hear the train or the motorcycle in the background or that tiny bug that is outside in the tree that is making its unique sound.
Just notice what you hear.
There is a real skill here to be able to come back to this very moment and just observing what's happening around you from a detached sense where you can just observe and just observe and breathe.
It seems so simple and so easy yet staying in this space takes a lot of practice and skill.
There's a deep sense of awareness and knowing that comes from the ability just to listen to the bug that's in the tree next to us.
So I encourage you to give yourself whatever grace you need to give yourself tonight that if your mind is still active from the day and that thoughts are still competing with your attention for the sounds around us,
It's okay.
Just give yourself a pat on the back that you've shown up and that you're here and that you're practicing because it's all just a practice.
Still breathing behind the scenes,
Breathing with intention and awareness.
I encourage you to end this practice tonight with three gratitudes,
With three gratitudes of something that naturally comes to your mind,
The first three things that you want to just appreciate.
Imagining yourself being filled from the inside with the vibration of gratitude and being simply grateful for closing out your day with that as what you are producing from the inside.
So on your next breath,
Take a little bit deeper of a breath and bring yourself back into the place of opening your eyes,
Noticing your surroundings and thanking yourself for showing up for tonight.
Thank you all and I wish you the best evening possible.
