Able is Oh This is just a short meditation for kids that involves breathing and visualizing.
It's meant to help you feel calm,
Hopeful and relaxed.
We'll begin with a short introduction about mindful breathing and then we will practice a breathing exercise and then end with a guided visualization about a hot air balloon.
Most of the time as humans we don't have to think about breathing.
It's an automatic process of the body and we can do it in our sleep which is lucky for us because it keeps us alive.
Scientists like to study the breath because even though the breath works perfectly fine on its own,
There is a lot of evidence that points to the health benefits when we learn to control our breath.
Basically scientific studies have shown us that controlling our breath can have different effects on our body.
For instance,
If you breathe quickly for short little spurts for even just a short period of time,
Your heart rate will quicken,
You may start to sweat or even feel lightheaded.
Conversely if you purposefully slow down your breath,
You can slow down your heart rate,
Cool off the overall temperature of your body and activate the relaxation response in the body.
While there are benefits to breathing quickly at some times,
In today's meditation we're going to focus more on the slower,
Relaxing kind of breathing.
Shall we begin?
Okay,
Let's begin.
So if you haven't already,
Take a moment to get yourself comfortable finding a way to maybe even just get 5% more comfortable.
One of the key aspects of relaxing is being comfortable.
You may choose to pull a soft blanket over your lap or snuggle into a cozy chair,
Whatever is the most relaxing to you.
You might even do this meditation while lying in your cozy bed before falling asleep.
Now that we're fully settled,
Let's take a moment to tune in to how our breath is happening in this moment.
Without changing,
Just notice what your breath is like.
Is it loud or quiet?
Is it soft or sharp?
Is it long and deep or quick and shallow or somewhere in between?
Does your breath feel warm or cool?
Is there anything else that you can notice about your breath?
Now we're going to try to change the breath a little bit.
To make it a little slower,
We can visualize the balloon,
Just a normal balloon.
So if you're able to close your eyes,
Try closing your eyes and picturing this balloon in your mind's eye.
You can picture its color,
Its shape,
Its size.
When you're ready,
Start to fill your lungs with air and as you do,
The balloon in your mind's eye gets filled with air too.
When your lungs are full,
So is your balloon and you hold your breath at the top for a second and then as slowly as you can let the air out.
We don't want the balloon to lose all of its air at once.
We want the air to seep out really slowly.
If it feels easy and natural to you,
Maybe you can let out a high-pitched sigh as you release the rest of the air from your lungs and from your balloon.
Beautiful.
Good job.
Now let your breathing come back to normal.
If you want,
We can fill the balloon back up,
But this time we're going to fill it with helium so that it can float.
Suddenly a helium machine appears and an adult fills your balloon with a gas that is even lighter than air.
They tie it off with a string that perfectly compliments the color of the balloon and then hands it back to you.
As you walk away with your balloon in hand,
You notice a hot air balloon in the sky.
It is really big and colorful and it has big letters on the side of it that say,
Make a wish.
So of course pause to think about what you might wish for.
When you close your eyes and you make the wish.
When you open your eyes again,
The hot air balloon in the sky has grown smaller in size as it's being carried off by the wind towards a gorgeous technicolor sunset.
Since you have nowhere else to be right now,
You decide to hang out a while and watch the sunset.
The hot air balloon keeps getting smaller and smaller in the sky,
Carrying your wish into the sunset.
Finally the last bits of color drain from the sky and it starts to get dark.
You hold your sweater a little tighter to your body and you yawn as you realize it is just about time for bed.
Heading in,
You see the first glimmers of twinkled stars in the summer night and you hear the sounds of the crickets chirping and the glow of the moonlight.
When you make it to your bed,
You tie your balloon to your bedside to remind you of your wish,
The hot air balloon in the technicolor sunset.
Good night.
Sleep tight.
Good night.
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