Who Am I?

In this session we begin with the engagement of the parasympathetic nervous system through calming of the body through breathwork (box/square breathing) leading to calm. We end with a contemplation of the sentence “I am”. This track was taken from the course ‘Hunt Your Own Shadow’, available now via my profile on Insight Timer.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to the session, I invite you to take a seat or lie down and get yourself comfortable. You can close down the eyes if you wish and take a deep slow breath in through the nose and out through the mouth. The reason that I start these sessions with a slow calm breath, With a shutting down of the eyes and with a turning of attention to the present moment, To mindfulness, To the body, Is because all of these things are biologically shown to calm the nervous system down, Because we can't be open to truth and introspection and insight and wisdom if we're tense, If our bodies are tense, Our mind is tense, But if our bodies are relaxed, Our mind begins to relax, It becomes a positive feedback loop, You calm the body, Which calms the mind, Which calms the body, And whilst you can develop deep levels of meditative practice to start to recognise and eventually gain control over the mind, It's far easier, At least initially, To gain control over the body. Given a minute or so, You can slow down the breath enough that it will start to slow down the body, The parasympathetic nervous system will trigger, And different systems in your body will start to relax, Your body will loosen, And then too will your mind. So what we're going to do now is practice a little bit of slow, Calm breathing, And the practice is this, And you can take this beyond this session, But basically you breathe in slowly for 4 seconds, Hold for 4 seconds, And then breathe out slowly for 4 seconds or more, And you continue to do this until you feel your heartbeat slowing down, This can be done in response to intense emotionality, Overwhelm, Fear, A significant event, As preparation before a performance, Or a competition, Or a presentation, Or just as a lead in to a meditation session or contemplation. So for the next few minutes, I'm going to count, In, 2, 3, 4, Hold, 2, 3, 4, Out, 2, 3, 4, Hold, 2, 3, 4, In, 2, 3, 4, Hold, 2, 3, 4, Out, 2, 3, 4, Hold, 2, 3, 4, In, 2, 3, 4, Hold, 2, 3, 4, Hold, 2, 3, 4, I invite you to continue breathing, And just begin to open up your mind to possibility, To potential. In a moment, I'm going to read you a sentence that I want you to finish, And just be open to whatever arises, The good, The bad, The ugly, The confusing, And just accept whatever arises, There are no wrong answers here. If we approach what arises with a welcome, Detached, Mindful gaze, We start to see what's lurking beneath the surface, But if we get scared or freak out in response to what arises, We block that part of ourselves off, At least a little bit, At least temporarily, So if something arises in this session, Or any session, I invite you to just accept it, Look at it, Observe it, And if those feelings of fear, Or judgement, Or pushing away arise, View them too, Because they are lenses towards different aspects of the shadow that can be unlocked, So I want you to finish the following sentence, I am, So, This simple sentence, I am, Is one of the best for evoking quick and deep insights into our present state, It cuts through to the core of our essence, And asks us to question and discover who and what we are, It can highlight negative emotionality and judgements, You know, I am, Insert negative response, It can highlight ego, I am great, It can push us down a more esoteric or spiritual path, I am energy, I am essence, I am love, I am inherently nothingness, This question, I am, Is a lens through which we can observe the current state of our consciousness, Who and what we are in this moment, Right now, But for the purposes of this session, I am going to look at the negativity that could potentially arise, The self-judgement, Because whether or not it arose in our little contemplation before, Thoughts of I am, I am, And then insert negative self-judgement, Arise almost daily, So it's important for us to take a look at those thoughts, And investigate them, And address them, Now and then, I am, I am, Perhaps your mind is screaming an answer, I am wrong, I am bad, I am unworthy, I am a bad person, A bad parent, A bad sibling, A bad son, A bad daughter, A bad whatever, I am not good enough, The first thing I want to say is that these thoughts are surprisingly common, Arising for almost everyone, Almost every day, We just don't see them in other people, Other people choose not to share them, You only see their highlight reel, You only see what they choose to share, Behind a smile may lie darkness, And particularly behind a social media profile certainly does, The reason I'm saying this is that you see every thought that goes through your mind, So you may feel that you've got a negative self-view relative to others, But you know any deep discussion with anyone, Any look into meditative literature or psychology, And you'll start to see that everyone has this inherent incessant chatter, And a lot of it's negative, And a lot of it's negative perhaps because of the conditioning we've been led to, Perhaps because of past experiences, And perhaps because of you know our inherent nature, Once again we evolved to look for danger, Look for anxieties, Look for worries, Look for things to improve or change, If we didn't perhaps we didn't survive long enough to pass on our genes, Evolution didn't reward contentment most of the time, It rewarded vigilance, It rewarded questioning, It rewarded worry, Because the person who was able to not be satiated kept looking even when they had stuff to survive, Kept trying to innovate, Kept trying to groan, Kept trying to survive, But the person that didn't stopped, But that was then, And this is now, And perhaps that feeling that negativity might be on hyperdrive, Because yes a certain level of vigilance and attention and questioning is productive, Fear and anxiety has its uses and shouldn't be completely eliminated, But it can certainly be turned down, The volume switch can be turned down, So I ask you again to finish the sentence, I am, And just invite whatever arises and sit with it, I am, And just turn your attention towards that statement and visualize traveling down that road backwards to its cause, What is the earliest memory that is arising in response to the I am statement, Travel there in your mind, Perhaps it's a memory of being yelled at, Being looked over, Being misled, Being bullied, Being abused, Confusion, Pain, Injury, Whatever that place is that this memory has taken you to, Keep looking deeper, Keep looking back to the earliest instance that is arising, And just observe it, Observe that person, And just inject that memory with a little bit of loving kindness, With acceptance, With a welcoming and understanding, With an invitation to say to that space or that place, I feel you, I accept you, I'm with you, I love you, Wish that person well, And offer that part of yourself, The comfort and support that arises, The comfort and support that they need, And beyond that, Make a pledge that whenever you notice yourself stating a negative I am statement, You just know that, First of all, That thought is temporary, You are not whatever arises, Because that thought will come and then it goes, But also that that thought is a finger pointing to something in the past, Something in the shadow that needs to be addressed, Needs to be resolved, Needs to be integrated, And the only way you can do that is by time and time again, Turning your attention back to the past, Allowing and accepting whatever arises to arise without judgment, Without filter, But perhaps with compassion and love for your past self, So I ask you once again to take a deep slow breath in through the nose and out through the mouth, And just sit in contemplation of the sentence, I am, I am, So well done, This brings us to the end of the session, At the bottom of your screen you'll see the option to view the classroom or to ask a question, And before moving on I invite you to take a moment to click through and share your insights, To read the answers from the other students and to hear my replies, This is an opportunity for deep learning, Further introspection and insight, So please don't miss out, I look forward to seeing you in the next session, Thank you. This track was taken from the course Hunt Your Own Shadow, It's out now and available through my InsightTimer profile, I invite you to check it out and I'll see you there.