So welcome to this practice.
Soften,
Allow,
And to love.
So finding a comfortable position and closing your eyes if this feels right for you,
And remembering as always to follow my guidance only if it feels right for you.
We're learning to pay attention to our bodies with kindness,
And we're cultivating compassion to what we find.
We're going to explore this within this practice.
So to begin with,
Taking three long,
Deep breaths in your own time.
And now an invitation to bring awareness to your body and the sensations occurring here in the present moment.
And then bringing your attention to the breath.
And if this feels right to you,
Focusing around the heart region of your body.
Begin to track each breath with mindful awareness.
Counting if that feels right for you,
Or simply observing the sensations of the breath around your heart area with mindful awareness.
Following each in-breath and each out-breath with your attention around the heart region.
You can place your hand here if that helps.
Now releasing your attention from the breath,
And letting your attention be drawn to the body,
Your breath,
To your body.
Softening,
Allowing,
And having kindness and compassion to what you notice.
And love,
Loving what you notice as it is.
What emotions can you notice in your body?
Where are they?
What exactly are the sensations?
An invitation to label what you notice.
To soften into the felt and physical experience of the emotion.
To allow it.
To be accepting of what you find,
Observing the sensations.
And perhaps turning towards it with love,
If you can.
With tenderness.
Now I invite you to bring in the difficult emotion you may have experienced today.
Nothing too juicy.
Once you've found it,
Softening into the body,
Being with the felt sensation of the emotion.
Allowing it to be as it is.
Being kind and curious.
Softening into that location in your body.
Let the muscles be soft without a requirement that they be soft,
Like applying heat to a sore area.
You can say soft,
Soft,
Soft,
Quietly to yourself to enhance the process.
Allowing the discomfort to be there.
Abandoning the wish for the feeling to disappear.
Let the discomfort go and come as it pleases,
Like a guest in your own home.
You can repeat,
Allow,
Allow,
Allow.
Now an invitation to bring some love to yourself for your suffering in this way.
Place your hand over your heart and breathe.
You can also direct love at the part of the body that is under stress.
It may help to think of your body as if you were the body of a beloved child.
Perhaps the body of your beloved inner child.
And you can repeat,
Love,
Love,
Love.
Soften,
Allow,
And love.
Soften,
Allow,
And love.
Use these three words like a mantra,
Reminding yourself to incline with tenderness towards your suffering.
If you experience too much discomfort with an emotion,
Stay with your breath.
Stay with your breath until you feel better.
Perhaps focusing on the breath around the heart area.
And then resting with the breath,
Or returning to the emotion.
Knowing that the breath is always there as an anchor to ground you in the present moment,
Both within the practice and outside of the practice.
An invitation to pause.
To simply be.
To ground and anchor in the moment using your breath.
Soften,
Allow,
And love.
And slowly opening your eyes when you're ready.
Or continuing for a little longer,
If that's something that you feel called to do.
And as best you can,
Taking this sense of connection and awareness and kindness into whatever you have left to do with your day.
