Spine long,
Begin to notice your breath.
Let your shoulder blades slide down your back,
Relaxing the soles of your feet,
The palms of your hands,
The four corners of your eyes,
The inside as well as the outside corners,
The region behind your ears and inside your ears.
Relaxing your tongue and pelvic floor.
Noticing your breath,
Becoming aware as it moves in and out through the tips of your nostrils.
Ear becoming breath.
Notice the temperature of the breath.
Can you tell which of your nostrils is dominant?
Is your breath rough or smooth?
Arriving,
Observing what is without judgment.
Notice whether your inhalation is longer than your exhale.
If the exhale is longer than your inhale,
Just observe without judgment.
How are you breathing right now?
The counts of your inhale and counts of your exhale without shaping your breath in any way.
If your breath right now is 3 counts in and 4 counts out,
Observe it for several breaths and then see if you can extend the length of both the inhale and the exhale.
Exhale,
Inhale adding one count to each.
Now let's follow the thread of your breath through your body.
Understanding what sensations are present without any judgment about them.
Cultivating the witness of your own experience.
Can you be at ease with the sensations you are feeling in your body?
Can you observe without reacting?
Scanning your body from top to bottom,
Noticing pockets of freedom,
Noticing constriction numbness,
Pain,
Pleasurable sensations of openness.
Without judgment,
Just sitting with what is.
Knowing that there is nothing that should be different,
Knowing that all the sensations are.
Understanding the sensations that are without judgment,
Welcoming it all in and then scanning your emotional body,
Noticing what feelings are present without any judgment about them.
Just acknowledge the emotion or lack of emotion,
Numbness perhaps and trust that your practice will bring balance into your emotional body.
Begin to notice,
To witness where the feeling or lack of feeling that you have identified is stored in your body.
Do you feel heaviness or flightiness in your chest,
Your belly,
Your head?
Does the feeling have a color,
A weight?
Does it have a texture?
You are the witness of your feelings,
Observing them with awareness,
With equanimity and then receive this numbness or flightliness as if you were welcoming a friend.
Let the sensation in your body or the feeling,
The emotion,
Let them know that here,
On your cushion,
On your mat,
It will not be shoved aside,
It won't be stuffed away.
Tell the feeling or its lack that this is a place even numbness,
Even anxiety will be embraced with acceptance and compassion.
Tell the sensation or the feeling,
Thank you,
I'm glad you're here,
Thank you for letting me know to bring attention to this place,
Thank you,
You are welcome here,
Radically accepting what is.
And then ask,
What do you need,
What can I do for you today,
My dear?
From this place of wholeness and compassion,
Ask yourself what do you need today?
What kind of practice would suit you?
Do you need to move slowly to meet the heaviness where it is and then become more active and energized?
Or do you need to move more actively,
Meeting your anxious feelings where they are and then gradually slowing down?
See if you can answer this question from this place of wholeness,
Radically accepting what is and intuitively listening to what is asked,
What do you need?
And if there is no answer for that today,
Let that be okay.
Make the answer or the lack thereof for being there.
And then when you're ready,
In your mind's eye,
Imagine that you're looking down on your physical body from high above.
Imagine the four corners of the room that you're in.
See yourself in the space,
The surface that you are on.
Looking at yourself from high above at this physical body,
Look with compassion and gratitude for this body that has carried you through all the years in this lifetime,
Through sadness,
Through joy,
Through abundance and emptiness,
Through achievement,
Through loss.
Give yourself an energetic hug,
Acknowledging yourself,
Grateful for this physical body and for its all,
For its accomplishments,
For everything that it has carried you through thus far.
And then when you're ready,
Take a deeper breath,
Let your breath expand to your fingertips,
To your feet.
Let it come deep in your lower belly,
Middle belly,
Top of your lungs,
Up to your shoulders.
Bring a little movement into your hands,
Into your neck,
Keeping your eyes closed or softly open,
Arriving back,
Welcoming yourself back.
Let it come deep in your lower belly,
Into your hips,
Into your hips,
Into your hips.
