Welcome,
Take a moment now to pause whatever you're doing and allow yourself to arrive fully in this moment.
Settle into a comfortable seated position,
Not rigid,
Not collapsed,
Just balanced and at ease.
Feel the support beneath you,
The ground or the chair or a mat,
Whatever's holding you,
It's holding you without expectation.
To help you sit tall and balanced and fight you to imagine that your body is made up of three balls stacked one upon the other.
The first ball rests at the level of your diaphragm,
Upside down,
Soft,
Wide,
Steady.
Just feel as your body relaxes beneath it and lets the breath move freely around it.
The second ball,
Also upside down,
Is the roof of your mouth,
Let the tongue rest,
The jaw relax,
The teeth gently part,
The head floating lightly above the neck.
The third ball is the inside of your skull,
Let the forehead smooth,
The temples soften.
Imagine the mind stilling like a pond,
Calm and still,
Quietly tall,
Open,
Present.
Now notice the breath moving in and moving out,
Steady,
Effortless,
Familiar.
Now gently let's turn towards something many people carry,
Often silently,
Shame,
Not the feeling of embarrassment of a moment,
But the deeper kind,
The kind that whispers,
I should be past this by now,
Why does this still affect me,
I shouldn't feel this way.
It shows up as pressure,
To cope better,
To give more,
To not disappoint.
Over time,
It tightens the breath,
It keeps the body on alert,
It makes rest feel undeserved.
Shame doesn't say,
That choice didn't work,
It says,
Something is wrong with me.
And that shift,
From behaviour to identity,
Is where it becomes toxic.
Here's another way to see it,
Shame is not proof that you failed,
It is proof that you cared,
That you were trying,
Learning,
Living.
Every perceived failure is not a verdict,
It's compost,
Rich soil,
Where wisdom grows.
Nothing meaningful grows without pressure,
Nothing authentic grows without being cracked open.
Like the phoenix,
We do not rise despite the fire,
We rise because the fire refines us.
Shame says the fire ruined you,
Growth knows that it strengthened you.
Before we go further,
Let's create safety here,
Nothing is being forced,
Nothing is being dug up,
You are always in control.
If emotion begins to surface,
A softness,
A memory,
Even tears,
That doesn't mean something is wrong,
It means something is ready.
Imagine your inner world is an onion,
It's made up of layer after layer.
You may have thought,
I have healed this already,
And perhaps you have,
At the depth you were ready for then.
Healing doesn't happen,
It doesn't rewind,
It happens when you're ready.
Sometimes you may not know where your shame has come from,
There may be no clear memory,
No obvious story,
And that's okay.
Often it arrives as tension,
Overthinking,
Self-doubt,
Or being hard on yourself.
You don't need to understand it to sit with it,
Healing begins with presence.
Over time you may notice the feelings soften more quickly,
Pass more gently,
Or hold less charge,
Not because you avoided them,
But because awareness is doing its quiet work.
Now take a slow breath in through the nose,
And as you exhale,
Imagine loosening any last shame deep within you.
You're not pushing it away,
You're just simply setting it down.
Feel the heartbeat,
The reliability of your breath,
You are here,
You are safe,
And you are growing.
Start to gently wiggle your fingers and toes,
Then roll the shoulders,
Maybe have a stretch if it feels good.
Take a final deep breath in through the nose,
And a long slow exhale out through the mouth.
Carry this sense of perspective with you,
Shame does not define you,
Awareness does,
Choice does,
And your capacity to change and grow is already within you.
Know that you can return to this practice at any time,
But until then,
Namaste.
