Trauma Informed Body Scan

This is a 38 minute trauma-informed body scan, suitable for those wishing to explore the body scan with an invitational attitude. For people who have experienced trauma, mindfulness meditation can sometimes exacerbate symptoms of traumatic stress. A trauma-informed approach invites participants to explore a way of practising that can help grounding into both the present moment and the physical body, with alternative options available if starting to feel too activated.

Transcript

This body scan meditation is designed to bring greater awareness to the body and the mind.

We will be doing this meditation in a state of relative stillness,

So it's best to arrange a time and a place where you won't be disturbed.

It can be done in a position of lying down on a yoga mat or on your bed,

Or if you prefer,

It could be done on a reclining chair or even sitting on an upright chair or standing up.

You might choose to have a light covering over your body and a little pillow under your head if that's more comfortable for you.

So inviting yourself to take your position on your chosen surface.

If you are lying down,

Just gently allowing the legs to fall out gently and the palms slightly facing upwards and then orientating yourself to your body in the room,

Noticing the room around you,

Perhaps the door or the window if there is one.

Acknowledging where you are and what day it is and perhaps what time of day it is and just getting a sense of this moment,

Of your body in this moment and then inviting yourself to gently close your eyes or if you prefer,

You can just hold your gaze gently ahead of you.

We will start this body scan meditation by orientating ourselves to our body.

So you might want to join me as we gently tap our heads,

The top of our heads,

Connecting our hands to our face,

Tapping the cheeks and the chin and the neck,

Connecting with your body as you are feeling the taps on your skin,

Going down the chest area,

The tummy area,

Around the sides of the waist,

Using both hands and just experiencing this as it unfolds in the moment.

And then finishing off this opening part of the body scan meditation by wrapping your hands around your body and perhaps just giving yourself a little hug,

Seeing how that feels just to hug yourself.

And then settling your hands back down onto the floor,

Inviting yourself to take three deep breaths in through the nose,

Out through the mouth,

In through the nose again,

Out through the mouth,

Last one.

And then allowing your breath to settle into its normal breathing pattern.

And then bringing our attention to our right big toe,

Seeing if it's possible to feel the right big toe,

Noticing how it feels in its position,

The end of your body,

Perhaps sensing sensations of the right big toe.

You might be experiencing some temperature feelings,

Coldness,

Warmness,

Perhaps a little bit of a tingling sensation.

Perhaps you're not feeling anything at all.

And whatever comes up in terms of what you're noticing in sensation,

Knowing that this body scan meditation is aiming at allowing any sensations to come up for us and seeing if it's possible to notice the sensations,

Seeing if any other emotions come up or thoughts perhaps about the sensations that you're feeling.

Perhaps you notice you're labeling the sensations as a thought or a question.

Why am I feeling this or that?

And if you're noticing that's happening,

If you're noticing your thoughts are wondering,

Knowing that that's very much a part of the human condition,

The human mind,

The wondering mind,

Gently when you notice that thought popping into your head,

Bringing your attention back to your right big toe,

Feeling it,

Noticing it,

And the sensations that you're feeling in your right big toe.

And then bringing your attention over to the left big toe,

Sensing the gap between the two toes,

Seeing if you can feel the position of the left big toe in your body and how it's lying on your foot.

Noticing the sensations,

You might notice you comparing it to the right side.

Again,

Some thoughts or labels might be attached to those comparisons.

And as and when that happens,

Noticing that you're going into thinking mode and gently bringing your attention back to the feeling of your left big toe.

And then slowly moving your awareness into the other toes,

The second toes,

The third toes,

The fourth toes,

And the fifth toes,

Feeling the edges of the toes,

Imagining perhaps that you're tracing the edges of your toes as you're going along the border of your feet,

Of the top of your toes.

And then gently bringing your attention round to the sides of your feet,

The undersides and the top,

The skin around the top part of your feet,

As well as the underneath part of the sides of your feet.

And then bringing the attention down to the heels,

Noticing now if you're in a lying down position what the heels feel like as they're resting on the floor.

Noticing the weight of the feet resting on the floor,

Noticing how the earth might seem to hold you there.

And then bringing your attention to your breath and noticing how the breath seems to just do its own thing without you having to do anything or needing to change it.

You might become aware of the feeling of wanting to control the breath,

Seeing if it's possible to notice your breath almost like an observer observing your breath and then feeling it.

Where do you feel the breath in your body right now?

Are you feeling it more in your chest?

Is it more in your nose or your throat or your tummy?

And see if it's possible to feel your breath in your body,

Bringing your attention down back to the heels and seeing if it's possible to feel your breath all the way down in the heels.

We're going to invite ourselves to use a place in our bodies that might feel safe and comforting to us,

Such as our breath,

Or if that's not safe and comforting for us,

Somewhere else in your body that feels like an anchoring to the body.

It might be the heels anchoring on the floor,

Or it might be something else that gives you a feeling of connection to this present moment and perhaps to your body.

So knowing that sometimes the breath can feel slightly or perhaps quite intensely uncomfortable or unpleasant for some people.

So inviting yourself to find a place in this body scan meditation that feels like you are anchoring to the moment.

And then moving away from the feeling of your heels on the floor and your feet,

Bringing your attention up from the feet,

Down the back of the calves,

Feeling how the calves are resting on the floor,

Sensing which part of the skin is touching the floor,

And then bringing your attention round to the front of your legs,

The shin area,

And feeling the sensations that might be arising in the shins.

Then bringing the attention up to the knees,

Taking a moment to imagine and appreciate the knees as knee joints,

Knowing that they hold our weight when we walk,

They bend when we need to bend our legs,

Honoring our bodies and our knees for all the work that they might do in our day.

And then bringing our awareness to the outside part of our knees,

The skin area,

Covering the kneecap,

The sides of the knees and the back of our knees,

And perhaps noticing the gap between the back of the knees and the floor,

The space.

And then it might help to consider a soft,

Light bandage being wrapped around your thighs,

From the knee area all the way up your thighs,

Wrapping.

It's almost as if you're imagining your awareness is a light,

Gentle bandage,

And your awareness is wrapping itself around and around and around,

All the way up to your thighs,

To the top of your thighs,

And seeing what sensations you're feeling as you're doing this.

You might notice there's some outside noises,

Perhaps there might be some external distractions,

And when that happens,

Seeing if it's possible to label those external sounds or distractions as sounds or distractions.

Noticing if there's any thoughts or opinions about these noises or sounds.

Becoming aware of any judgments that we might hold about these outside noises,

Positive or negative,

Comforting or frustrating.

And then gently bringing our tensions back to the body,

Moving our tension to the pelvis area,

The lower back area,

Sensing our pelvic lower backs resting on the floor or on the bed.

Noticing our weight being held by the earth,

And seeing if it's possible to notice your breath in this part of our body.

Noticing what happens on the in-breath in this part of the body,

As well as the out-breath.

And remembering that if the suggestion of bringing your attention to your breath is unhelpful,

Just reminding yourself that you have other options of bringing your attention to other anchors in your body,

Or perhaps external anchors.

It might be helpful to curiously explore the feeling of feeling your breath in your body.

But if it's not helpful,

You can discard the suggestion and bring your attention back to the physical feeling and sensation of your lower back on the floor.

And then bringing your attention to the front part of your body,

The tummy area,

Noticing any sensations that might be arising in the tummy,

Honouring all that happens in this abdomen part of our bodies,

Knowing that things are happening without us being aware,

Our digestion,

Our immune systems,

Our breathing.

All of this happening without us needing to do anything.

And seeing if it's possible to sense our abdomens and the internal workings of our abdomens.

You might be becoming aware of sensations in this area.

Perhaps there's some noises,

Gurgling,

Perhaps a temperature feeling of warmth or of relaxation,

Or perhaps you're noticing more unpleasant sensations,

Cramping,

Aching,

Tightening,

Tension,

Tingling.

Noticing if any judgements or labels are coming up for you as you bring your attention to these sensations in your abdomen.

Being curious about these judgements that you might be holding about these sensations.

Noticing how we might be attaching a positive or a negative label to these sensations.

Perhaps noticing how pain might be labelled as bad and warmth and comfort is labelled as good.

And then bringing your attention back to the sensations.

Seeing if it's possible to feel the sensations as they are.

And then bringing our attentions higher up to our chest area.

Noticing how the breath moves in this area.

This area where our lungs are housed.

The air moving in and out.

Noticing how our diaphragms might be working and moving.

And then bringing our attentions to the actual movement of the air in our chests.

It might be helpful to imagine a little boat bobbing up and down on the ocean,

Imagining that our chests are an ocean and our attention and awareness is sitting on this little boat that's moving up and down as our breaths are moving in and out.

And then bringing our attentions to the back of our chest back area around our shoulder blades,

Feeling how our shoulder blades are resting on the floor or on the bed.

Then sensing our arms as they are,

As you are finding your arms,

Noticing what position they are in and where your hands are and where your palms might be.

And then bringing our awareness to the feeling in our hands,

The skin of our palms and the outside feeling of our hands.

And then gently bringing our attention to our fingers,

Starting at the thumbs,

Moving our attention to the forefingers and the middle fingers,

The ring fingers and the little fingers.

And seeing if you can notice the sensations in the hands.

You might be noticing temperature feelings.

Perhaps you're not feeling anything at all.

Bringing your awareness to this not feeling anything at all and knowing and acknowledging that this is awareness in itself,

Feeling the not feeling.

And just noticing if you have again any labels or feelings or emotions about the not feeling.

And then bringing our tensions up to the wrist area,

Feeling how the wrists might be resting on the floor,

Bringing our awareness a little bit higher up towards the forearms and all the way up to the elbows,

Sensing the elbows perhaps being a resting point on the floor,

Connecting with the floor,

Grounding us to the floor,

With the floor holding us.

And then bringing our tensions to the upper part of our arms,

Back up to the shoulders,

Feeling our upper shoulder area,

The meaty part between the shoulders and the neck.

Noticing any tension we might be holding in that area.

Perhaps you're noticing your breath in your shoulder area.

You can have your breath in your villages.

You might be noticing your thoughts are wandering into the future or into the past,

Or perhaps imagining something.

And as and when you notice this happening,

Reminding yourself that this is part and parcel of our experience as a human.

Bringing your attention back to the shoulder area.

And perhaps sensing the shoulders,

Not just from the sensation of the shoulders,

But perhaps a slightly bigger awareness of the shoulder area.

Noticing the shoulders as they might be holding your weight on the floor.

Perhaps noticing the air of your breath being held in the shoulder area.

Knowing and acknowledging that this shoulder area often is a place that we tend to carry a lot of our tension and our worry.

And seeing if any of this comes up for you as you bring your attention to your shoulder area.

Shoulder and neck area.

Noticing any pain that you might be feeling.

And seeing if it's possible to bring your attention from the feeling of knowing that there's pain to perhaps sensing it as a sensation.

Seeing if it's possible to notice the sensation of pain.

And imagining exactly where that pain might be in your shoulders.

Noticing any responses or reactions that you might be feeling in the feeling tone of your body as you bring your attention to the discomfort.

Noticing any panicking feelings,

Concerning feelings,

Worrying feelings.

And then bringing your attention a little bit higher up into the neck area,

Back of the neck area,

All the way to the place where your head is resting on the bed or on the floor.

Taking contact with your head and your skull as it's resting on the floor.

And perhaps seeing if it's possible to connect with your breath in this part of your body.

Perhaps noticing if your breath is more felt on the out breath more than the in breath in this area.

Or maybe it's the other way around.

Perhaps you're not feeling your breath there at all.

Seeing if it's possible to bring an emotion of curiosity to your body and your breath.

Hmm,

Wondering where's my breath?

Am I able to feel it?

Can I feel it in my head?

Perhaps noticing how my head is resting on the floor.

And then seeing if it's possible to explore your head in its entirety.

Noticing how it feels not just at the back of your head but also the front of your face.

Your jaw area,

Your mouth,

Your nose,

Your eyes,

Your forehead.

Seeing if you can bring your awareness to perhaps the inside of your mouth,

Your tongue,

Your teeth,

The insides of your cheeks.

Breathing the air perhaps in your nose area,

Coming in and out if that's where you're breathing.

And then we're going to be finishing off this body scan by bringing our attention to the tippy top of our heads.

Seeing if it's possible to bring our attention to the breath as it's moving in and out through your body.

And seeing if it's possible to notice it going from the top of your head down to the bottom of your feet where we started this body scan.

You might want to take a slightly deeper breath than normal.

Bringing the body from the top all the way to the bottom of your feet.

Feeling the air moving into your body and out of your body in its entirety.

And then as this body scan draws to a close,

I'd like to invite you to gently start bringing your attention and awareness to your body in the room or on the bed.

And if your eyes were closed,

You might want to start gently fluttering or opening the eyes.

Wiggling your hands and your feet,

Bringing your attention back to the space that we're in.

And acknowledging yourself for having spent this time with your body in the body scan.

Reviews

It wasn't as expected. I started the body scan to find relief to get back to sleep. Instead, it uncovered different bodily sensations in various parts of my body, which is really a good thing. It showed what body and mind are currently processing in the midst of my healing journey. So thank you for giving me the space to feel!