Hello and welcome.
My name is Sarah.
Thank you for joining this meditation.
We will be taking a mindfulness for beginners practice.
Let's begin by establishing a comfortable seat.
Sitting tall but not rigid,
The back,
The body can be supported in any way.
First,
Before we begin our mindfulness practice in itself,
A brief discussion.
What is mindfulness?
Mindfulness is a practice of simply paying attention,
Observing the present moment as it exists.
Mindfulness at its core is essentially a focus practice,
A focus training so that we may develop deeper awareness,
Deeper awareness of what's happening,
How we're feeling in the now.
Practicing mindfulness in this way has many,
Many benefits including the calming of the mind,
Creating a spaciousness in the mind which of course then creates a ripple effect of relaxation and calm throughout the body.
I think there is a misunderstanding that mindfulness or meditation means that we try to think of nothing but in fact that's not the case because that's not really how the brain works.
So let's put this into practice right here and now.
We will use the tool of our breath to engage in this mindfulness,
To practice this focus practice and this is essentially where the mind is being trained.
So it's not about not thinking,
It's about focusing the awareness,
I.
E.
The mind,
Its attention in this instance on our breathing.
So let us begin the meditation practice itself.
Please make any adjustments to your seat.
The eyes can come to close and then we shift our awareness to our breathing,
Simply observing it freely,
Observing its rhythm and its pattern.
And when we shift our attention,
In even this moment of mindfulness,
We can observe a change,
Maybe a sigh,
An exhale,
A yawn and then we may notice that the breath becomes even and fluid again.
We can pay attention to the breath moving in and out of the nostrils,
The pace,
The sensation and of course at some point the mind will begin to wander.
The brain is built to assess and compute.
So we use this opportunity of the mind wandering as a perfect time to put the technique right back into practice of focusing on our breath.
And again the mind may wander and we hold compassion for this.
There's no need to be frustrated or feel like we're failing.
We're simply coming back to the focus practice,
Allowing our body to remain calm.
And over time,
What you may observe is that the mind has wandered but what you may notice is that the mind wanders to very similar places,
Similar subjects.
So we begin to observe the nature of our thoughts when they start to move away from the breath watching focus and we can observe if what is on repeat is supportive or destructive.
And we do this without judgment.
We just take note.
We take note of what is on repeat.
Where do we go when we get pulled away?
What's been pressing us?
What has been distracting our mind,
Holding our attention?
Again without judgment,
Use the technique of noticing the mind has wandered and then apply the coming back to the awareness of the breathing.
Again allowing and inviting the body to remain relaxed.
Let's take a fuller breath to begin to conclude this mindfulness practice.
Taking some gentle movement,
Wiggling the fingers and the toes,
Blinking open the eyes,
A gentle smile to the face.
Thank you so much for spending your time in this way.
May the rest of your day be peace filled and blessed.
Thank you.
