Mindfulness Sitting Practice (MBSR/MBCT)

This 30-minute practice explores the four scopes of mindful awareness and is guided in the style of the MBSR or MBCT. There is no need to actually do this sitting. If another position is better for you right now, feeling free to honor what is right for your body. This practice is great for learning to relate differently to body sensations, thoughts and emotions, as well as develop focus and cultivate equanimity. By opening to body sensations, thoughts and emotions, we can explore the patterns of our mind and make choices about how we would like to relate to our experience.

Transcript

Inviting you now to settle into a comfortable sitting position,

Either on a straight-backed chair or a soft surface on the floor,

Supported by cushions or a low stool.

And if you use a chair,

It could be helpful to sit away from the back of the chair so that your spine is self-supporting.

You might want to raise your buttocks up a little bit or angle it so that your hips are just slightly above your knees.

And if you're sitting on the floor,

It could be helpful if your knees are touching the floor,

So also experimenting with the height of the cushions or stool until you feel quite firmly supported.

So arranging things so that your knees are slightly lower than your hips.

And if you're in a chair,

You might want to set your feet on the floor without crossing your legs.

And inviting you now to gently close your eyes,

Or if you'd like to just leave your eyes open and lower your gaze,

That's fine too.

And inviting in an attention of kindness and patience and curiosity to this practice.

Inviting your attention to come to the physical sensations of touch and pressure in your body,

Wherever it's making contact with the floor or the seat you're on.

Inviting you to spend a few moments now exploring the sensations of the contact in your experience just as it is.

Perhaps noticing pressure or temperature,

Softness or texture.

And when you're ready now,

Inviting your attention to shift up to sensations in the lower abdomen as the breath moves in and out of your body.

It may be helpful to place your hand on your lower abdomen and notice the changing pattern of sensations where your hand makes contact with your abdomen.

And once you've sort of tuned into the sensations here,

You can remove your hand and continue to focus on the sensations in the abdominal wall.

Perhaps noticing how the abdomen stretches and rises on the in-breath and gently deflates with each out-breath.

And so as best as you can,

Following with your awareness the waves of the changing physical sensations in your lower abdomen all the way through,

All the way up and all the way down as the breath enters your body on the in-breath and as it leaves the body on the out-breath.

Perhaps noticing the slight pauses between one in-breath and the next out-breath,

Or vice versa,

Between one out-breath and the next in-breath.

So no need to control the breath in any way,

Simply letting the breath breathe itself and inviting the awareness to the sensations in the body near the abdomen.

If this doesn't feel right for you right now,

You can also choose a different anchor.

So you could choose the sensations in your hands or some area of the body where you're noticing sensations quite readily.

So bringing also a flexibility and allowing yourself to make adaptations as you need,

And also as best you can bringing an attitude of allowing,

Allowing your experience to be just as it is,

Nothing to be fixed and no particular state to achieve,

Just simply allowing your experience to be your experience without needing it to be other than it is or noticing any desire of that,

Just lightly holding that.

And so inviting you to stay with this anchor that you've chosen,

Either the breath or the belly and the abdomen and the movements of the breath in the abdomen or some other anchor point in your body as best you can for a few moments.

And if the mind wanders away from this anchor point,

That's just what minds do,

So you can perhaps notice what's going on,

So it's not a mistake or a failure,

Just noticing that the awareness is no longer on the breath and even perhaps congratulating yourself for really coming back and noticing,

Acknowledging perhaps where the mind has been,

Oh yeah,

I was thinking or I was planning,

And then gently escorting your awareness back to the focus you've chosen and the changing pattern of physical sensations there.

So as best you can,

Sort of renewing your intention to pay attention to the ongoing sensations right here,

Right now.

And so as many times as the mind wanders,

That's what the mind will do,

Inviting your awareness back very gently and kindly and perhaps even inviting an air of patience when the mind wanders away and curiosity to your experience.

So taking a few moments now to just be with the sensations of the breath,

With the sensations in your body as best you can.

And now when you're ready,

When you feel a little more centered,

Making an intention to allow your awareness to sort of expand out around that sensation of focus and including a sense of physical sensations throughout the whole body.

So perhaps still being aware in the background of the movements of breath in the lower abdomen or the sensations wherever you chose your anchor,

But expanding your primary focus or changing it so that you're more aware of the sense of the whole body and the changing patterns of sensation throughout the whole body.

You may notice sensations of movement from the breathing in the body.

So perhaps you might notice the whole body breathing,

Almost like a person-shaped bubble expanding and contracting.

And so now together with this wider sense of the body and of the breath moving in and out,

Perhaps including an awareness of the more particular patterns that arise in specific areas of the body,

Perhaps again where the body makes contact with the floor or chair or cushion,

Sensations of touch or pressure,

Noticing sensation of support wherever your weight is being supported in the hands where they're resting perhaps on the thighs or on each other.

And as best you can,

Holding all of these sensations together with the sense of the breathing body.

Again,

The mind will certainly wander away from the breath and body sensations and this is what minds do,

It's to be expected.

And so remembering that,

We can just simply notice when the mind has drifted and even congratulate ourselves,

So you've woken up to your experience again,

Perhaps gently noting where the mind was,

Thinking,

Planning,

Fantasy,

Memory.

And when you're ready,

Then kindly inviting your attention to move back to this focus of the whole breathing body and the sensations in the body.

And as best you can,

Inviting a simplicity here,

Just gently attending to these sensations throughout the whole body from one moment to the next.

You may notice that in some areas,

The body,

Some intensity may arise and that your attention sort of gets called to these areas and sensations and away from that focus on the breath or body as a whole.

And so you may choose to experiment here and shift your attention,

Remaining still but bringing your awareness into that area of its intensity.

So you might sort of explore with a gentle curiosity and wise attention to these more intricate or detailed patterns of sensations here.

What exactly does this feel like in the body?

Is it shifting or changing or does it sort of remain the same?

So not so much thinking about them,

But more like feeling them.

And if you notice quite a bit of intensity,

Perhaps inviting the breath to breathe into the area as you breathe in and then breathe out from those sensations,

Softening and opening with the out-breath,

Just taking a few moments now to continue keeping our awareness with the whole breathing body and exploring or experimenting perhaps with areas of intensity if that feels right,

Making choices around the intensity,

Maybe even a choice to shift or move.

So just kindly attending to your experience in that intensity and making a choice,

Bringing the breath,

Breathing in and out of the area,

Getting curious about the sensations or even shifting or moving if that's needed.

And whenever you find yourself sort of carried away from awareness in the moment by the intensity or any other distraction or any other thing that calls your attention,

And just remembering or reminding yourself that you can always bring your awareness back to the sense of the body as a whole or even back to the movements of the breath or that more focused attention.

And once you've gathered yourself again,

Allowing the awareness to expand once more out to include all of the sensations of the whole body.

And now inviting you to allow your awareness to shift from the sensations in the body to your hearing.

So bringing your attention up to the ears and then inviting or allowing the awareness to open and expand so that there's a receptiveness to the sounds just as they arise,

Wherever they arise.

So almost as if they were like leaves falling to the ground,

There's no need to go searching for sounds or listening for particular sounds,

But instead the invitation is to simply open your awareness to the sound from all directions,

Sounds that are close to you,

Sounds that might be more far away in front of you or behind you,

Next to you,

Above or below,

Or even from inside you.

So opening to the whole space of sound around you and inviting an awareness of these sounds,

Ones that are perhaps more obvious,

Others are more subtle,

And even noticing the space between sounds,

Silence.

So as best you can,

Being aware of sounds simply as sensations.

So if you find that you're thinking about the sounds,

Just as if you were distracted and thought reconnecting,

So inviting you to reconnect and as best you can,

Open back out to the awareness of the qualities of sound,

Perhaps just noticing their pitch or timbre,

Loudness,

Duration,

Rather than their meanings or implications.

So just taking a few moments now to open to sounds,

Almost just as if you're receiving a symphony of different sounds.

Perhaps at some point you'll notice that your mind is no longer focused on sound.

It has become,

Again,

Carried away in thought,

And so gently acknowledging where the mind has gone and then inviting your awareness back to the sounds as they arise from one moment to the next.

Noticing the beginning and ending of each sound or the staccato or the constants,

Bringing the mind back to sound.

Now when you're ready,

Inviting you to let go of the awareness of sounds and invite your awareness to thoughts as events in the mind.

So just like with the sounds,

You focused your awareness on sounds that arose,

Noticing them arise,

Develop,

And pass away.

Now as best as you can,

Bringing your awareness to thoughts that arise in the mind,

And just the same way,

Noticing when they arise and focusing on them as they pass through the space of the mind and eventually disappear.

And so no need to make thoughts come or go,

Just letting them arise naturally in the same way that you'd relate to sounds arising and passing away or the breath arising and passing away with each in and out breath.

Now this might be a little challenging,

So it might be helpful to bring awareness to thoughts with a metaphor.

So perhaps imagining that thoughts were clouds in the sky,

And perhaps you've risen well above the clouds,

And looking down you can see all the clouds passing by,

Thoughts,

And they come in and out of your awareness,

And you just notice them and let them keep floating by.

Or perhaps the idea of a projection on a screen at the cinema,

So you sit and watch the screen waiting for a thought or an image to arise,

And when it does,

You pay attention to it as long as it's there,

Sort of on the screen,

And then you let it go as it passes away.

And so if those are helpful for you,

This is a way we can start to become aware of thoughts arising and falling in our mind's eye.

Sometimes thoughts might be a little slippery or hard to detect or they start and then they kind of disappear,

So just being with whatever arises just as it is,

There's no right way or wrong way.

Thoughts can show up as images or words,

And perhaps sometimes thoughts come with some intense feelings or emotions,

Pleasant or unpleasant,

So as best you can noticing the emotional charge or the emotional intensity of the thought,

And just registering that and letting it be just as it is,

But just noticing,

Oh,

Wow,

There's some anger here too,

Or there's excitement with this thought.

And if at any time you notice that the mind has gotten quite grasped by a thought,

Perhaps drawn into a drama or thinking or an imagery,

Perhaps just noticing where this might show up in your body,

Noticing what's happening there,

Perhaps noticing contraction or tightness in the face,

Or wanting to push away the thoughts and feelings,

So just exploring and seeing if you notice anything like this going on for you when intense feelings arise or intense thoughts arise,

And then once you've noticed this,

Just seeing if it's possible to come back to the breath.

Perhaps it's easier to find an area of focus,

The breath,

Or an area of the body,

Where the sense of the body is the whole,

Just sitting and breathing,

And so using this to anchor again and stabilize your awareness,

And when you're ready,

Expanding back out to thoughts and emotions.

There might be moments where there's no thought detectable,

And that's okay too,

Just noticing space between.

I'm now inviting you to explore the possibility of letting go of thoughts and emotions and any other particular object of attention,

Like the breath or any other objects of attention you've chosen,

And so expanding your awareness out to an openness,

And almost as if you were sitting in that theater or sitting on the bank of a river or deep into the blue sky,

And allowing or open to whatever arises in the landscape of the mind and body,

And so just resting in awareness itself,

Resting in that deep blue sky,

And then as best you can,

Observing or noticing what arises most noticeably from moment to moment,

So that might be a sensation of the breath or something in the body or a sound or a thought or feelings,

And so as best you can,

Not searching or focusing on a particular thing,

But just being open to what calls your attention,

And perhaps being with that for a moment,

Observing,

And then letting it go and opening out to the next event.

So without any agenda or anything to do in particular other than to open to this awareness,

Sitting completely awake,

Not holding on to anything or looking or searching,

Just being in this awareness and then noticing what arises,

Perhaps labeling it and letting it go again and opening back out,

Perhaps you notice recurring patterns in the mind or body,

And so if the mind wanders away,

Just as always,

Perhaps coming back to an anchor,

A chosen anchor,

Whenever you need,

And then expanding out again,

And now when you're ready,

Letting go of the open awareness and inviting your attention back to the body as a whole,

Breathing here,

So narrowing your attention back down,

Sensing the whole body breathing,

And now expanding your attention out to sensations of contact,

So the outer shell of your body,

Perhaps noticing the air on your skin,

Any sensations of clothing,

And as best you can,

Inviting an intention to bring this mindful awareness into the next moments of your day.