Welcome to a beginner's guide to mindful meditation.
If this is your first time practicing meditation or mindfulness,
Welcome.
I hope you certainly enjoy your experience.
I've often heard that people don't feel like meditation is right for them because they have difficulty stilling or quieting the mind.
What I like to tell beginners is that the practice of mindfulness and the practice of meditation is actually not necessarily about quieting the mind or getting the mind to stop or become completely still.
Our minds are designed to work quite efficiently and quite regularly for us.
They're problem solvers and so they're always sort of working on puzzles for us and so therefore it's rare that they're ever very quiet or very still.
And so with meditation it's actually more the practice of witnessing what you're experiencing,
Witnessing what your mind is doing,
And just allowing yourself without judgment or criticism just to notice what that experience and present-mindedness is like.
Just sort of observing your own experience.
So if this is your first practice of meditation or mindfulness,
Please be very compassionate,
Be very kind to yourself.
Again it's not about getting anything right or being perfect,
It's just about bringing awareness to your own present moment,
To your own experience,
And just witnessing what may be happening for you at this place and time.
And each and every day it will be a completely different experience.
So let's begin by just finding a nice comfortable seat.
So you're either welcome to sit on the floor,
Maybe in a gentle cross-legged position.
You're also welcome to sit on a blanket or a bolster or perhaps a cushion if you are seated on the floor.
And blankets often help to support you as well and sort of soften where your legs or knees are folded onto the floor.
You're also welcome to sit upright in a chair that often can be very easy and very comfortable for those beginning mindfulness or meditation.
And just make sure that your feet are connected to the floor beneath you,
That your limbs aren't crossed in any way,
And that your back is nice and upright and straight,
And that you're not necessarily leaning back in the chair.
You actually want the strength of your spine to support you and so you're not sort of leaning or resting back.
And then just find yourself in that comfortable seated position,
Whatever it is for you,
And it can change day to day,
Whatever feels right.
And then from there you're either welcome to keep the hands in your lap,
Either gently folded together or perhaps resting on the knees or the legs,
Either palms face up or palms facing down.
Again,
Whatever feels absolutely right for you here in this moment.
And then I'd like to invite you either to close your eyes if that feels like that's the right thing for today,
Or just maybe find a nice soft gentle focus,
Allowing yourself just to give your eyes a bit of a rest.
And then from here just allow yourself to let go of anything that may be happening later today.
Allow yourself to let go of anything that may have happened prior to your arriving here at this place in time.
And then also just allowing yourself to explore something new,
Something different.
Perhaps just noticing if your mind is saying something like,
Wow this feels really strange or this is really weird already.
Whatever that chatter might be,
Just see if you can witness it,
Just observe it.
And then perhaps choose not to engage with it.
So each and every day we have thoughts or feelings and emotions that may come up for us.
And when that happens we have an opportunity at that time to sort of choose to buy into that story,
Or perhaps not.
Perhaps we can just sit back,
Witness and observe whatever that happens to be.
And then in that moment of space perhaps choosing either to engage or not to engage with whatever that happens to be.
So as we begin our practice today,
Let's start by just grounding and rooting in,
Noticing your seat on the chair,
Or perhaps on the floor beneath you.
Just noticing the weight of the body,
Noticing the connection with the chair and the support,
And certainly the beautiful grounded support of the earth beneath you.
Just allow yourself to root and ground down,
Noticing that feeling.
And then with your mind's eye we'll start to travel up through the back of the spine.
So starting with the sit bones and then traveling up through the lower spine,
Up through the mid-back,
Just going vertebrae by vertebrae,
Seeing if you can find a little more length,
A little more reach,
A little more openness.
So as you're scanning up back through the back of the spine,
Up through the mid-back and upper back,
Perhaps rolling the shoulders back and down,
Allowing yourself to find a little more space.
And then traveling up through the back of the shoulders,
The back of the neck,
Up through the back of the skull,
And then at the top of the crown of the head.
Just see if you can allow the crown of the head to lift up towards the ceiling,
Lifting up towards the sky,
Reaching,
Creating a little more space,
A little more in alignment.
So ideally you want your head,
Your neck and your shoulders to be directly above your hips.
So you've got this beautiful lengthened push-pull energy of the liftedness with the crown of the head and then the groundedness with the sit bones and the earth beneath you.
And then from here,
We'll just start to settle in,
Noticing what our bodies feel like,
Beginning to check in and noticing perhaps what the breath is doing.
So just starting to breathe deeply in and out through the nose,
Bringing the awareness to our breath and just settling in,
Relaxing a little bit more with each deep breath in and out through the nose.
And then on your next inhale,
Let's breathe in deeply together.
So breathing in through the nose and then release it out through the mouth with a loud sigh.
Beautiful.
We'll do another one just like that.
So breathing in deeply through the nose and then releasing out through the mouth.
And one more in through the nose and really letting it all go this time.
Beautiful.
So now that we've let go,
We've released some of that tightness,
That tension,
That gripping.
Just allow yourself once again to connect in with the breath,
Breathing in and out deeply through the nose.
And then just beginning to witness that experience for yourself.
So perhaps noticing where the breath enters through the nose at the tip of the nostrils.
Perhaps noticing the breath as it enters in through the back of the throat,
Traveling down in through the lungs and witnessing the expansion and contraction of the lungs and the rib cage.
So noticing the gentle rise and fall of the chest.
Breathing in deeply all the way down deep into the diaphragm,
Just exploring that range of motion,
That expansion and contraction for yourself.
And then as we're breathing in and out here,
I'll just invite you to allow your mind just to rest on that experience of the breath,
Breathing in and out.
And then for the next few moments of our mindful practice,
We'll just allow ourselves to rest our attention and focus on the experience of the breath.
So just breathing in and out,
There's nothing else that you need to do or focus on or worry about.
And just notice what you may be experiencing.
So if a thought or feeling or emotion or itch or something else maybe comes up during this process,
Just see if you can notice it without engaging or interacting.
Just allow the thought or the feeling or the emotion just to pass,
Once again reconnecting,
Refocusing on the breath.
Breathing in and out,
Just notice what you may be experiencing.
Breathing in and out,
Just notice what you may be experiencing.
Any noises or outside distractions come up,
Whatever it happens to be,
Just see if you can let it go.
Once again,
Returning to the breath,
Almost like if you were guiding a little puppy who had steered off course,
Just guide him back onto the path of the focus on the breath without any criticism or judgment,
Just gently guiding them back.
Breathing in and out,
Just notice what you may be experiencing.
And on your next inhale,
Let's start to breathe in a little bit more deeply,
Beginning to reconnect intentionally with the body and the breath,
Just noticing your own experience.
And then ever so gently,
We'll start to come back into the body,
So perhaps gently starting to wiggle the fingers,
Perhaps wiggling the toes,
Just notice what that sensation feels like,
And then perhaps expanding that movement,
So maybe rotating the wrists or rotating the ankles,
Perhaps flexing the feet,
And then ever so gently increasing that movement,
Making it a little bit larger,
Bringing the legs and the arms,
Perhaps the elbows and the knees,
Just exploring your own range of motion,
Perhaps doing a few cat and cow positions with your back,
Perhaps stretching to the right side,
Stretching to the left,
Just explore and feel whatever is calling you at this moment,
Listening to your own bodies.
Continuing to breathe deeply in and out through the nose,
And then once that exploration of movement feels complete,
Just allowing yourself to come back into stillness for one final moment as we close our practice the same way we began.
So once again,
Let's breathe in deeply through the nose,
And then exhale out through the mouth with a sigh.
We'll do another one just like that,
In through the nose,
And releasing out through the mouth,
And then a final one just for you this time,
So breathing in through the nose,
And really letting everything all out.
Beautiful.
Finally,
In closing our practice,
Let's bring our hands together at our heart center in a prayer hands position,
Just powing your head ever so slightly forward to your heart,
Recognizing that you've taken this time and space to care for yourself,
To check in with your body,
Mind,
And spirit,
Acknowledge how you're feeling in this moment compared to when we began our practice,
And then in that moment of gratitude and grace for the blessing of being together to care for ourselves and one another,
I invite you to join me in our signature salutation at the end,
Which means the light in me honors the light in you.
So we'll bow forward together ever so slightly to our hearts.
Namaste.
Thank you for joining me.
I hope you have a beautiful rest of your afternoon,
Evening,
Or morning with love and light.
Namaste.
