Welcome to this guided meditation.
In this meditation we will together explore meditating with the breath.
Perspectives of mindfulness or awareness of the breath.
And that kind of meditation is very beneficial.
The benefit of the breath is that,
How many meditators experience it,
Is that it can be used in so many different ways.
That might sound a bit abstract,
And I think in this meditation we'll try to keep it simple.
But also,
If you use meditation of the breath long-term,
It has so many different ways to approach.
So,
It can help you to maybe calm the mind more,
Stabilize the mind.
It can also be used in ways that might give more energy,
So.
.
.
And as well it can also really be used as a tool to connect to deeper wisdom,
Deeper understanding of the nature of our reality.
Not to be too overwhelming,
But just to.
.
.
Yeah,
Personally I always found that very beneficial about this type of meditation that it just has so many aspects to it.
You can really also maybe have some variation and use it as a very kind of all-round tool in your practice belt.
And also the nice thing is that you can also later on,
Surely not in the beginning,
But add certain additional elements to the breath.
What I mean is for example practice of loving kindness,
Breathing with loving kindness.
And yeah,
This I found myself very beneficial and especially for meditators who might be happy with such a kind of all-round tool,
But also a tool that they can use with variety.
So yeah,
Maybe that's enough of an introduction and I think we can just get started together.
And again,
Today we will try to keep it a bit basic,
But for me personally,
It always has helped to have kind of the confidence in that way of meditating,
Can just be used in so many different ways.
Although we can also keep it simple.
So it can also sometimes be very basic and simple to fall back to,
Which is also a benefit.
Yeah.
So without further ado we can get started by settling in into our meditation posture.
So for most people that will be sitting on a chair or a cushion.
Most important that you sit in a way that's comfortable and that you can maintain for long enough time to do this practice together.
And you can also practice this while you walk or while you stand or lie down.
But it might be easiest to at least get started with sitting.
It's the most clear,
Most comfortable.
But it's really a benefit that we can take this practice with us in all kinds of postures.
Again,
We start by just sitting in a comfortable way,
Just maybe being aware and checking in with the body.
How's the body feeling?
Comfortable,
Uncomfortable?
Tired or energized?
What do you find in the body right now?
And then you can become aware of the body breathing,
So.
.
.
Some people are happy to find a very focused point to be aware of the breath.
Although personally I would recommend to also experiment with just being aware in a bit of a broader way of the breath.
Maybe feel to a degree the upper body moving with in and out breath expanding and contracting Just in a natural way you can be aware of breathing in and breathing out.
If you want,
Especially in the beginning,
You might want to make a note.
Breathing in,
Breathing out,
Or in-out.
But it's not strictly necessary.
There's also the knowing of the mind.
Just recognizing it as inner out-breath without using the words.
So you can take a few breaths in this way,
Just being aware of breathing in and out.
And when we are aware of the breath,
We try to do it in a way that we don't change the breath.
We just are aware of the breath coming in and out.
And if we notice that we are controlling the breath,
We can just let go.
Let the body breathe.
And the body really knows how to breathe.
So much of the time it's an unconscious process.
Something that we don't have to control.
But of course if we pay attention to the breath,
Sometimes the mind gets involved and that's also okay,
Completely natural.
That we try,
When we are aware of the breath,
To let the breath breathe itself.
Can be beneficial to try and breathe only through the nose.
Especially the in-breath.
But if it's not comfortable you can also breathe through the mouth.
And while you're practicing like this,
You can just check in with the face.
What is the facial expression that's there?
Especially if it's quite tense or.
.
.
Grimaced in some way.
We can relax the face,
Facial expressions,
And even invite just a gentle smile.
Whatever also feels natural of course,
No need to force anything that doesn't feel okay.
And just try to keep bringing your awareness back to the breath.
So whenever we notice we're not with the breath anymore,
Maybe the mind thinking about the past or the future or just distracted to anything else than a breath.
Would you gently invite the mind back to pay attention to the breath going in and out?
And if we notice that the mind is getting lost quite a bit,
Or even if it's going alright,
One thing we can try is just to count the breath in and out.
And we can,
For example,
Count to 10.
So you can count the in-breath one and out-breath two.
In-breath 3 and out-breath 4.
We can count all the way up to 10 and then you can start again.
Every time you notice the mind has slipped off of the breath,
You're not anymore paying attention to the breath,
You can just start counting again at 1.
In breath 1,
Out breath 2.
And just keep counting like that every time until 10.
If you like another number,
You can pick another number as well.
Otherwise,
10 can be a good number.
Just let the breath breathe itself as it does.
What can help sometimes is after the out-breath that you just wait and see when the in-breath comes.
Especially if you notice that you're controlling the breath,
That can sometimes help to just only breathe out and then wait for the breath to take its own in-breath,
So to say.
We don't have to hold our breath purposefully,
But.
.
.
Just to see the breath do what it does by itself.
And just keep coming back to breathing 10 times.
Or breathing 5 times for 10 counts.
Technically speaking.
And again,
Feel free to change that number if you wish.
What you can also do is every time you have done a count of 10,
You can make a second count in your head,
Knowing that you've completed one round of 10.
You can decide to do a specific number of rounds of 10,
So.
.
.
Maybe counting also to 10.
But it requires a bit more of a wordless way of counting.
Almost like picturing something in your mind.
Like 10 circles or something like this.
Again to just give you 10 counts and then 10 times 10 counts it is all just meant to give some kind of kind of a kind of a crux.
Kind of a tool for the mind to.
.
.
To find stability on.
But you can also feel free to let go of the counting and just staying with every in and out breath.
Counting can help if you.
.
.
If you notice that the mind is wandering a lot.
So let's continue for a while longer.
Being aware of the breath in that way.
And slowly you can start to come out of the meditation.
Open your eyes if you had them closed.
And we just take a moment to round up together.
And kind of make the transition back into other activities.
Take a moment to connect to a sense of gratitude that you did this practice.
Free practice ideas that can bring a bit more stability,
Peace.
This can really benefit us in the rest of our day and as well the people that we meet.
Can bring benefit to them as well.
Which is something that is really a gift to ourselves and others.
And even when you go about other activities,
You can.
And if you do this regularly,
You might not even need to think about it.
You might just notice sometimes when you have a moment that you're waiting or standing still or.
.
.
Having time for it,
You can just connect to counting the breath,
Staying with the breath,
And in little moments here and there find some peace and stability.
So I wish you a good remainder of your day and encourage you to try to keep doing this in your daily life and also knowing that you are always welcome to come back to this meditation and then you can also continue your practice in this way.
I wish you all the best and hereby we together finish this session.
All the best.
