Welcome everyone.
Please take a few moments to mindfully make your way into a comfortable supine position upon your backside.
And gradually making our way into relative stillness.
And then from relative stillness,
If we haven't done so already,
Take a moment to invite the windows of the eyes to gently close.
We'll take a moment to intentionally arrive into the present moment,
The here and now,
As we draw our attention to the breath at the center of the chest.
Three times,
Taking a full conscious inhale through the nose,
Releasing the exhale out the mouth with any sounds that come from the nervous system.
Two more times,
Please.
In through the nose,
Intentionally arriving on the exhale out the mouth.
And one final time.
In through the nose and out through the mouth.
After that final exhale,
Inviting the jaw to gently close,
Leaving a little gap between the teeth.
And perhaps taking a moment to swallow the tongue,
Releasing any tension to the muscles of the face.
We'll begin our guided body scan by gently drawing our attention to the contact,
The touching points of our heels against the floor.
From the contact of our heels,
Taking a moment to draw your attention into the soles of your feet.
And then into the toes,
We may begin to notice that wherever we place our attention or our awareness,
It's as if we're turning up the volume on sensation as we begin to become more acute of the language of the body,
The tingling,
The streaming of energy.
Bringing our attention down through the soles of the feet into the heels once again.
And now up through the ankles and beginning to notice the gap between the Achilles tendons and the floor.
And continuing to draw our attention up the legs,
We become aware of the touching points of the calf muscles.
Take a moment to pause here in your lower legs to envision the muscles of your calves and the two bones of the lower leg.
Imagining that these bones are resting upon the pillow of support of the muscles beneath them.
From the lower legs,
We'll continue our body scan,
Moving up into the joints of the knees.
You may notice a subtle gap between the knee joints and the floor.
Take a moment to pause at the knees,
Allowing the knees to be as heavy as these joints actually are.
And now drawing our compassionate awareness into the upper legs,
Noticing the touching points of the back of the thighs.
Taking a moment to pause here.
As we did in the lower legs,
Beginning to envision the muscles of the hamstrings acting as a pillow of support for this long,
Heavy bone referred to as the femur.
And then beginning to imagine that the muscles of the quads on the top of the thighs are beginning to relax and drape and hang over the bone of the femur like clothes drying on a clothes rack.
Allowing these legs to be as heavy as legs actually are.
Drawing our attention up into the touching points of the muscles of the buttocks,
The glutes,
Into the midline of what was formerly our tail and into the sacrum.
Taking a moment to envision the pelvic bowl and what it might feel like to release all muscular effort within these hips.
And now we'll pause here in your mind's eye beginning to visualize just the lower half of your body from the pelvic floor all the way down to the soles of the feet.
And envisioning the imprint that this lower half of your body would leave in this mat or in this blanket or bed if all muscular effort and tension dissolved.
Gradually bringing our attention now back to the midline of the spine at the sacrum.
Gently drawing our attention up the length of the spine through the lower back noticing the gap beneath the lumbar spine and the floor.
And as we continue to draw our attention up the length of the spine,
The thoracic spine eventually comes back into contact with the floor beneath us.
Up between the shoulder blades,
Allowing the spine and the shoulder blades to gently let go.
Taking a moment to pause within this anatomical region of your body.
Moving our attention now into the shoulders and down the back of the arms.
Observing the touching points of the triceps,
The muscles on the back of the arm.
Acting as a pillow of support for the upper bone referred to as the humerus.
Taking a moment to envision the muscles of the biceps relaxing and draping themselves over this upper bone.
And then down into the elbows,
Pausing just as we did in the knees to visualize the elbow joints becoming heavy.
Down into the forearms,
Visualizing the two bones of the lower half of the arms.
Down through the wrists and into our hands.
Taking a moment to draw your attention mindfully into your pinky fingers.
And then into your ring fingers,
Your middle fingers,
Your index fingers,
And your thumbs.
And then into the center of your palms.
Noticing any sensations of tingling,
Streaming,
Or pulsing.
And very mindfully we'll draw our attention back up the length of the arms.
Through the forearms,
The elbows,
The upper arms,
And into the shoulders.
And returning to the midline of the spine and into the neck.
Noticing the gap beneath the cervical spine of the neck and the ground.
And then shifting our attention now into the contact and the touching points of the skull.
Allowing this head to be as heavy as a human skull actually is.
Allowing the contents of this skull,
The brain,
Mind,
And thoughts to gently dissolve into the support of the floor.
And then next we'll shift our attention to the muscles of the face.
Taking a moment to visualize the muscles of what's referred to as the brow ridge where your eyebrows rest.
Allowing any tension here to dissolve.
Just into the eye sockets themselves,
Allowing the eyes to become heavy.
Down through the nose,
Relaxing through the muscles of the cheeks,
The jaw,
And the tongue.
Taking a moment to visualize the upper half of your body within your mind's eye.
And allowing it to be as heavy as the upper half of a body can actually be.
And finally allowing your attention to expand and encompass the entirety of your physical body.
Visualizing the imprint that this body is leaving upon the mat,
Upon the blanket,
Upon the mattress.
With a conscious inhale through the nose,
Letting go of the exhale out the mouth with any sounds that release from the nervous system.
And just taking a few moments to rest within the experience of sensation within this body.
