Mindfulness Of The Breath - Anapanasati (With Warm-Up)

This practice begins with a mindfulness warm up of coming to one's senses. This is followed by classic exercises of mindfulness of the natural breath. These practices are essential for integrating mindfulness and finding a natural pace in one's daily life.

Transcript

Beginning the meditation,

You can find a comfortable position,

Whether that's sitting down,

Lying down,

Standing up,

Making sure it's a posture that you can keep for a while.

If you're sitting down,

Your spine is in a good position,

Your hips are able to roll forward a bit,

Allowing yourself to sit at your full height comfortably.

If you're laying down,

Maybe something under your knees,

And standing up,

Then again you're in a natural posture.

I'd like you to start the meditation with your eyes open,

So taking in the landscape or the room which you're in.

Looking around,

You might see inanimate objects,

Or maybe you're not alone.

Maybe your animals or other people meditating with you.

You might also be able to enjoy seeing some nature,

And its natural movement,

Life,

And allow that to be part of your meditation.

And as you really start to focus on your visual field,

Noticing movement,

Stillness,

Noticing shapes,

And your mind's natural tendency to try to label things that you see,

Put a word to it.

But as we practice mindfulness,

Letting go of the labels,

And staying with the experience.

Experience of different shapes.

Experience of different colors.

Some light and shadow,

And perhaps things you haven't seen before.

And you might already notice your mind floating away to other thoughts,

To something else besides your visual field,

Noticing that it's part of the meditation,

Coming back to the objects that we're focused on,

Which is your field of vision.

And beginning to allow your field of vision to,

Your eyes,

To rest.

Seeing your eyes to go a bit downcast,

And noticing your peripheral vision as well,

And the limitations to your sight.

Maybe even for a moment,

Trying to experience who is seeing.

Where is the seeing coming from?

And if it's comfortable for you,

You can allow your eyes to close,

Or if not,

You can keep them just a bit downcast,

But starting to shift your object of attention from sight to sound.

And beginning with just hearing the sound of my voice.

Hearing as it comes and goes.

And noticing the sounds,

The soundscape of wherever you are,

If you're indoors,

Outdoors.

You may be able to hear the sounds of a building,

Sounds coming from outside the room that you're in or far away.

Again,

If you're outdoors,

You might hear rustling of leaves,

Wind,

Sounds of a city,

Sounds of nature.

Trying all of that to be part of the meditation,

To welcome it into the meditation.

And again,

You might notice your mind's natural tendency to try to label,

Create pictures or stories around things,

And seeing if you can let that fade away and give your attention to just experiencing the sounds in the present moment.

And noticing also sounds that are coming from nearby,

And that includes your own body,

Digestion,

Heartbeat,

Sounds of your breathing or movement.

A ringing in your ears or other artifacts of hearing.

You might even be able to hear the sound of the room that you're in as other sounds bounce off the walls.

You might be able to hear the shapes and distance of things.

If you listen closely.

Or if you're meditating with animals or other people,

Even hearing the sound of their breath,

You might be able to tell something about their inner life.

And listening to your own breath,

You might be able to tell something about your inner life.

And as you listen to the body starting to shift from sound over to feeling,

Then you might notice your emotional state.

You might notice resistance.

You might notice calm.

You might notice restlessness or impatience.

You might feel solid,

Steadfast,

Settled.

You might feel excited.

Noticing wherever your emotional state may be,

Not trying to make anything better or worse,

But allowing and experiencing,

Moving closer to experience.

And noticing any tension in the body,

Noticing any pain in the body.

And then beginning to feel,

Starting with your toes,

You might feel tingling.

You might feel warmth,

Cold.

You might feel pressure.

Feeling the bottoms of your feet,

Tops of your feet.

Feeling sensations in your ankles and shins,

Calf muscles,

Feeling clothing on your body,

Pressure,

Feeling a mat underneath you or a couch or a bed or just feeling the floor under your feet.

And feeling sensations in your knees,

Again,

You might feel pressure,

Feel a sensation of energy.

You might feel a change in temperature.

Feeling your thighs and hamstrings,

Again,

Feeling clothing,

Pressure,

Temperature.

Feeling the weight of your body sitting on a cushion or chair.

You may feel a sensation in the weight of your body and your butt.

If you're laying down,

You might feel it all the way in your back and legs.

And then getting to some of the tension areas where you might hold stress in our body,

We hold an experience or a response to an experience.

You might not have thought of it in that way before,

Tension as a response to something in your environment,

Inner environment or external,

But your body remembers,

Your body responds.

So noticing tension in the pelvic area,

Sensations in the pelvic area,

Tension,

Sensations in the lower belly and,

You know,

Your body might release,

Relax,

But it might not feel safe yet to do that.

So just allowing whatever happens.

As you go through the meditation,

You might start to feel more safe and at ease or go through the meditation a few times.

It might take that for your body to start to let go.

Internally,

Sensations are on your lower belly,

Your stomach,

Feeling your chest expand and release with the breath.

You might feel sensations in your lower back.

Feel closing on your skin,

Your belly,

Chest,

Your back as your body expands and releases with the breath.

Feeling sensations in your,

Around your heart,

Your good heart.

Again,

There might be emotions here,

Maybe not ones that you can label and put a word to.

Just experiencing any emotional feelings in this area.

Your solar plexus or your heart,

Throat,

Shoulders.

Feeling sensations all the way down your upper arms,

Elbows,

Forearms,

Hands and fingers.

Noticing temperature,

Tingling,

Pressure,

Movement.

And letting all the sensations in your hands and fingers capture your attention.

Savoring those sensations.

And then again,

Feeling sensations in the throat,

The neck,

The base of the skull and the jaw.

Again,

It might be strange,

But feeling sensations all the way down the esophagus,

Allowing the esophagus to relax and release all the way down to your stomach.

And feeling sensations around the teeth,

Gums,

Tongue,

Even in the chin and lips.

Feeling all your facial muscles relax and release in your cheeks.

We often use our facial muscles to communicate with other people,

To present in a way socially at work.

Show it in our life.

Right now just allowing it all to drop.

Allow the mass to drop and allow yourself,

Instead of doing,

Presenting,

Just to be.

Feeling sensations around your forehead,

Scalp,

Ears.

And allowing the whole body to relax and release into a stillness.

And then allowing it to release into a deeper stillness,

A really felt sense of stillness internally.

And in that stillness,

You can allow all intentional movement to release and let go,

But also allowing the involuntary movement of your body,

The breathing,

To happen.

And also if you need to sneeze,

Cough,

Fart,

Whatever it is,

Just allow it all to happen.

Whatever your body needs to do to take care of itself.

And letting go of any tension that inhibits that involuntary breath.

Letting it be very full and free,

So we're letting go of any control,

Any hesitation.

Really fear.

Just let yourself breathe.

Feeling the natural in-breath and natural out-breath.

And trusting your body.

And feeling the sensation of that natural breath.

And we can start feeling the breath in the body,

So you can notice the movement of your body as you breathe.

Notice as your body expands and releases,

You might feel sensation in different areas.

And I'd like you to explore where you feel the breath.

So how do you actually know that you're breathing?

Where is that sensory input coming from?

And as you do this,

Not making the breath stronger,

Right?

We're still just allowing the body to breathe naturally.

And you might feel sensations in the pelvic area,

Lower belly,

The chest,

The throat.

You might feel sensations around the nose.

And then I'd like you to bring your attention just to the area around your nose and begin to feel the breath just from that one place.

And I'd like you to feel around the upper lip,

Around the nostrils.

Maybe notice the difference between the in-breath and the out-breath.

And you can also notice if your breath is short,

Long breath.

If it's deep or shallow,

If it's slow or fast,

Loud or quiet.

And then just noticing the breath in the area around the nose.

And thinking about focusing on the breath as a microscope.

And you can zoom way in and feel the bitty hairs on your nose.

We'd like to zoom a little bit further out,

A little bit more relaxed.

Just feeling the breath generally in the area around the nose.

So we don't care if it's the right nostril or left or if it's on the upper lip or just in the general area.

Just noticing that we feel something there.

And already your mind might have wandered away to other things.

What we can do to help you keep a sustained awareness on the feeling of the breath is start counting.

And we'll only count to ten because if you count beyond that you might get too focused on the counting and too little.

We're not really expanding your short-term memory,

Your working memory.

So that's what we're kind of working on right now.

Sustaining the attention over time.

Mindfulness over time.

So mindfulness of the feeling of the breath and the area around the nose.

I'd like you to feel the in-breath,

Feel the out-breath and on the out-breath once it ends count one.

In-breath,

Out-breath,

Two.

In-breath,

Out-breath,

Three.

And as you go along allowing your body to set the pace again.

We're not interrupting or trying to control the breath.

We're not trying to make the breath stronger so we can feel it more around the nose but just allowing the body to breathe.

Feeling the in-breath,

Feeling the out-breath and counting.

And you can even count where you place that number one,

Two,

The inner voice also in the area around the nose.

So everything is focused just in one area.

We're developing one pointed concentration.

Savoring the feeling of that natural breath,

The area around the nose and counting.

We'll go up to ten three times or so.

So I'll check back in in just a couple minutes.

Feeling the in-breath,

Counting to ten and starting again at one.

So you can feel the in-breath,

Counting to ten and starting again at one.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And then noticing where your mind is.

Coming back to feeling the breath.

And beginning the let go of counting,

I'd like you to move towards feeling the full in-breath and full out-breath.

So feeling the beginning,

Middle,

And end breath.

And then feeling the breath.

I'd like you to move towards feeling the full in-breath and full out-breath.

So feeling the beginning,

Middle,

And end of the in-breath until it turns into the out-breath.

And feeling the beginning,

Middle,

And end of the out-breath until it turns into the in-breath.

And so forth.

Feeling the full cycle of the breath and seeing if you can keep a sustained awareness of the sensation of the breath.

And we'll do that for just a minute or so.

So feeling the full in-breath all the way in,

All the way out,

Until it becomes the out-breath.

Feeling that full cycle,

Continuous awareness of the sensation of breathing in the area of the out-breath.

Thank you.

And noticing where your mind goes and coming back to feeling just three more breaths.

And then letting go,

Feeling the full in-breath and full out-breath.

And I'd like you just to savor the breath.

Just enjoy whatever you can feel,

The breathing,

However you want to breathe.

Just feeling the breath for a couple more breaths.

Enjoying it in the same way that you might savor the sensation of a delicious chocolate or delicious wine or dessert or some savory food.

And then beginning to let go of the breathing.

Let go of focusing on the breath,

Coming back to the body,

Feeling the movement of your body.

Feeling all the sensations in your body.

Coming back to your sense of hearing,

So bringing that back online,

Noticing the soundscape.

And really how your whole being feels.

And when you're ready,

You can slowly open your eyes,

Staying in that meditative space.

Noticing all the things you can hear,

All the things that you can see,

That you can feel.

And when you're ready,

You can take a deep in-breath and small stretch.

And enjoy.

Reviews

I thought this practice was skillfully guided. I unexpectedly had a deep appreciation for sounds. The feeling of space between sounds was noticeable and brought a feeling of peace in silence. The body awareness had lots of depth and I really enjoyed following the breath per the instructions. I feel like this practice will really help me with my concentration and deepen non judgment and full acceptance for how things actually arise in the breath and body. Thank you for this and I will definitely be using this often! I plan on exploring your other guided meditations too! Boundless Metta to you! 🙏🏼😊

Thanks for your guidance

Your voice is lovely and comforting😊Thanks!

Really lovely Thankyou.

Beautiful . Simple. short meditation. Thank you 🙏🏼

Perfect thank you 💚🧘🏼‍♀️

Very gentle, guided mindfulness of breathing meditation. Excellent for regaining & developing attention to anapanatasati. Thank you! 🙏

Very very nice. Just a simple meditation that was very centering and mellow for me. Very little wandering mind. Thank you! ☮️🙏💖

Thankyou for this beautiful and helpful practice 🙏