Pervading Rest

This guided meditation actively trains the ability to identify restful sensory experiences in the body, allowing practitioners to find ease not only during formal practice, but eventually at any time during daily life.

Transcript

So So whenever you start a formal practice period like this,

I'll recommend that you really take your time to notice your posture because it's important to be comfortable.

It's distracting if you have parts of your body falling asleep,

Pins and needles,

Or the kind of slouching that feels good for a minute but then causes pain.

So just check and see if your back is comfortable,

If it's well supported so that you're upright and relaxed.

And here's some common areas you can check in with.

Notice your arms and your hands and see if there's any just habitual tension that you can let go of.

They might be holding themselves in position and it's not necessary now.

You can place your arms in a way that they can completely relax.

Same thing with your legs.

See if they can relax even a little more.

And a lot of people hold tension in their shoulders.

It may be that if you just place your attention there,

They might be able to sink a little bit more.

Just letting go and letting gravity pull on you.

And one of my favorite things to notice is the head and the face and we may not think of this when we think of where we hold tension but there's just so much energy all the time and thinking and doing and interacting with people,

Being on Zoom calls.

We do so much automatically responding appropriately to people,

Takes facial muscles,

Thinking engages our facial muscles.

So see what happens if you just invite this entire surface of your face to relax.

You may also be able to relax your jaw and even your scalp a little bit.

It's kind of like your face.

There's just a little energy all over your head that you might be able to release.

And if not,

That's fine,

It's just an idea works for some people.

So we're going to stay in this focus range today of feeling rest,

Somatic experience of restfulness.

And the reason I say it like that is because we're going to intentionally not engage with anything visual or auditory.

So that's thought space,

Right?

Any thinking which includes mental images,

Narration about what you're doing right now,

Planning the day,

Anything environmental too like we know Rocio has some construction going on,

That's a great opportunity to build concentration when you have something like that.

Because your job will be to return your attention on purpose to rest in the body every time that hammering pulls your attention.

So to build equanimity,

We do a couple of things.

We do our best to maintain a welcoming attitude to distractions like they're not enemies,

They're friends,

They're to give us information to help us with concentration.

And we strengthen our ability to maintain this welcoming attitude toward things over which we have no control.

Simple skill right now,

Right?

So there are some things we can't control so we may as well let them come and go and place our attention where we do have agency.

So from here on in you can just try to keep your attention in the space of your body.

And a little bit more specifically,

We'll try to tune in just to what's restful or relaxing.

And you can stay with what works for you,

What you like,

Or you can try out a few different things.

One of the most reliable ways to focus on somatic rest is to pay attention to the exhale in particular.

And you may notice a literal sinking that your shoulders tend to drop when you breathe out.

And muscles in your abdomen relax when you exhale.

And what makes this a mindfulness practice and helps you get the most out of it and strengthen your attentional skills,

Build your baseline of attentional skills,

Is really tuning into your focus range a little bit more deeply the longer we stay with it.

So maybe at first when you take a breath you're just intellectually aware that you're breathing and then with each breath see if you can soak in a little bit more deeply like as though your body was like a dry sponge and your attention is like water and it soaks in a little bit more and a little bit more and a little bit more.

So that after a few breaths you're really feeling specific places in your body that you can feel that spreading and sinking sensation of muscles as they relax just like they would if you were falling asleep only now you get to pay attention you get to really enjoy that sensation And there are lots of benefits to becoming more familiar with what physical rest feels like for you.

It sensitizes you to the existence of those feelings so when it naturally or spontaneously happens in daily life you're more likely to get that little pleasure and ease from noticing.

Also makes it easier for you to contact it if you feel a need to step back or calm down.

You can quickly gain the ability even while you're in conversation with somebody to just kind of step back into your own body and make contact with this restorative sensation that's always available.

It's just a matter of developing the sensory acuity and the skill of being able to contact it at will.

So staying with your breath is comfortable and accessible for you,

That's great.

You can stay with that.

And if it doesn't feel too satisfying you can try other things too.

You can see if you have just a global sense of rest over the whole body.

Some people identify better with that.

Just noticing that you might be in a moment where there's just not much activation.

If you're free of pain,

Free of itching,

Free of hunger.

And a couple other ways are particularly good for everyday life.

If you come across a time when you very distinctly do not feel relaxed and you can't find rest anywhere then you can do one of these things.

You can create it on purpose by making a fist or raising your shoulders up,

Creating tension and then letting it go.

So that you have a guarantee there of always being able to contact relative rest.

The feeling of letting go.

And finally you might also want to familiarize yourself with the fact that there are always some neutral places in the body somewhere that seems to be empty,

Devoid of sensation.

And that can be really useful if you ever have physical pain.

It's also useful to teach your kids if they are upset either emotionally or if they're physically injured.

This is really easy for kids to learn how to put their attention on where they don't feel the pain.

But it only really works to teach it if we can do it.

So you might want to see if you can find something now.

You can move away from a place where you feel activated until you notice that the sensation is gone.

Like with one of my kids who tends to anxiety,

He feels that in the middle of his body so we'll move out.

And by the time we get to his elbows or his wrists,

He'll find a place where there's nowhere to worry.

Or you can check in with a place like your earlobes or the backs of your hands if they're not touching anything.

This may be tricky because it's subtle.

How do you feel a lack of feeling?

But see if you can just keep your attention on this part of your body that's not activated.

It's a type of rest.

So maybe one of these appealed to you the most or maybe you'd like to continue to move from one to the other for a few minutes.

Whether it's your exhale,

Global rest,

Muscle relaxation,

A neutral place.

All of these are feeling rest.

So for just a couple more minutes,

Practice whichever way works best for you,

Staying with one restful sensation or moving about.

But try to keep your attention on restful experience in the body.

And if you're pulled by thoughts or anything else,

Active or auditory,

You just use that as a friendly cue to place your attention back on restful experience.

And it may help to use a label to stay on track every few seconds.

You can make contact where you notice a restful sensation and then say to yourself,

Rest.

It's a tool that boosts concentration and equanimity by connecting you with your experience and keeping a calm,

Even tone in the way you speak to yourself.

Okay,

So a little aut Tideline.

And as soon as we're quiet for just a couple minutes,

You may find your mind wandering or maybe not even notice that your mind was wandering.

And that's okay.

The most important thing there is to learn not to beat ourselves up for it,

To learn to let go of any frustration or judgment as quickly as possible.

That's the skill we're building is to just notice,

Let go,

Return to rest.

So to transition out of this practice,

Here's the really important part is to try to bring some of what you've just contacted,

Hopefully a new sensory acuity too,

To bring it into your daily life.

That's where this stuff is useful.

So see if you can open your eyes and still contact a restful sensation in your body.

See you soon.

Reviews

I have consistently struggled to contact Rest but somehow Marcy gets through to me that I can find rest or create relative rest no matter what. Thank you 🙏🏻

I am absolutely delighted to find you here, Marcy. I love this meditation a lot, it provides a simple, clear and pleasant guidance to feel rest in its pure form. Thank you for bringing UM to Insight Timer.

I really appreciate the detailed guidance on how to find relaxation when you don't feel relaxed. Very helpful teaching, thank you.