Mood Booster | Breathwork & Meditation Exploration | 22-Mins

And as the hands are softening,

As the body is starting to settle and land,

Relax the shoulders,

Relax the jaw and smooth out the forehead.

Letting relaxation ripple through all of the facial muscles now and then letting it trickle down through the rest of the body until you meet your feet.

And for this mood boosting breath and meditation practice we begin with this centering thought.

What a day to be alive.

What a day to be alive.

Notice what arises or is not there when that statement is placed.

What a day to be alive.

And with that statement draw it down into your heart center.

Let it alchemize here.

Tuning in to that vibration of acknowledgement of the gift of life.

That acknowledgement of having the opportunity to live today.

You know,

Coming back to that foundational realization.

And as time moves over the next few moments start to allow the breath a little bit more space now.

Breathing in fully through the nose.

Wash it out through the mouth.

Take two more like that and as you inhale imagine this lovely high frequency of warmth and connection drawing into the body.

And as you exhale any low vibrational thoughts,

Feelings,

Ideas just release from the mind-body.

When you've had three of those breaths gently sealing off the lips and letting the breath flow freely through the nose.

Nasal breathing.

What a day to be alive.

Allow that statement to infuse the way that you breathe now.

Letting the breath find a little bit more length and breadth within your body.

And over the next few moments I'm going to invite you to gently bring your awareness into your heart space.

The center of your chest.

In yogic tradition we call this Anahata.

The heart space.

And the color associated to this part of our being is green.

So you might choose to simply visualize the color green here in your heart space.

And then as you start to breathe start to rhythmically count now up to five and down to five.

So breathing in for five and out for five.

And the whole time you're still keeping your awareness in the heart space and you're imagining that the breath were amplifying the color,

The warmth here.

And the breath out you are finding more space here.

Heart breathing in for five,

Out for five.

Sinking up with a heartbeat.

The beat of a heart.

Noticing what tone of green you visualized if you've gone there.

Is it deep and earthy?

Is it light and bright?

Is it more of a pastel green?

Just finding that coloring and letting yourself bathe within it through the breath.

This is the practice for the next few minutes.

In for five,

Out for five.

Heart opening,

Breathing.

Explore for yourself.

Breathing in for five and out for five.

Noticing if the mind went elsewhere.

It's okay if it did.

Just noticing if it did and gently navigating it back to the breath for a few more rounds.

Heart breath.

Utilizing the intercostal muscles as you breathe in to expand through the rib cage and allowing that gentle contraction of rib cage to spine as you breathe out for the last two rounds of heart breathing.

Imagine that the breath had the power which it does to realign.

To bring you into alignment with yourself once again.

Making this the last round if you haven't already done so.

And then we gently return to nasal breathing without any counting,

Without any shaping.

Just resting your awareness on the breath.

Letting any sounds in your space infuse your practice.

Invite them in.

Letting any sensations in the body or mind infuse your practice.

Invite them in.

You don't need to push back and away from.

We can open.

Open toward and bring it all in.

For what we resist persists.

So if we're able to open,

To invite,

To look in,

We've got much better chance of alchemizing what needs to alchemize so that we can come back into balance.

So just noticing now at this stage in your practice if anything has changed.

Has anything shifted since you began?

And it's okay if nothing changed.

We move with compassion as we observe.

I invite you now to clear the slate,

To wipe the slate clean from what has been today.

Bring a sense of renewal to this moment and I ask you to look back to review a little bit now.

So just letting your mind cast its way back through the day and I invite you to find a moment where maybe you did something that you weren't so proud of.

Maybe it was the way you made your coffee.

Maybe it was communication you had with a loved one or a colleague.

Maybe it was something that just didn't go the way that you'd planned or wished.

And I invite you to look through the lens of compassion at yourself in that moment.

And as you look through that space and that time,

Notice if anything is felt in the body,

In the mind.

Let it be there and I invite you to bring that deep into your heart space and inviting that color of green to wash through those feelings,

Those thoughts.

And know that you did your best with that moment.

We're just humans.

We're figuring it all out.

We're not AI.

We're not robots.

We're human beings and we do things that aren't perfect all the time.

So are you able to gently embrace yourself energetically and just take a moment of compassion?

It's okay to not be perfect.

It's okay to not execute everything perfectly.

It's good to be a human.

And then I invite you to cast your mind back through the day.

Wipe the slate clean again.

Journey back through this day and find a moment where you feel pretty proud of yourself.

Like something went well.

Maybe again it was something you did physically or made.

Maybe it's something you said or the way you said it.

But find something I urge you today that you're proud of.

And again letting that drop into the heart space and allowing the color of green to imbue this feeling of warmth,

Of connection,

Of celebration of that moment.

And notice how it makes you feel or what thoughts come to mind when you really allow yourself to celebrate you in that moment.

To acknowledge something good that existed in the day.

And then allowing the breath to fill up the body incrementally over the next few breaths.

Coming back to presence through the breath.

Letting all those visuals of the day,

The feelings just wash away through the next few rounds of breath now.

And then we're going to drop again into the heart.

And I'm going to plant a question here in your heart space for you to explore and contemplate in this meditation.

It's a very simple question but one that we maybe need to bring to our forefront more as each day unfolds.

I'll let you be the judge of that.

And the question is what am I grateful for today?

What am I grateful for today?

And then just allow the list to take shape visually,

Emotionally,

Mentally,

However you want to traverse this.

What am I grateful for today?

And just when one thing's over go and look for something else.

Let it be this internal list.

And let gratitude fill you up.

And if the mind takes you elsewhere or maybe into other thoughts come back to the question what am I grateful for today?

When we tune in to gratitude we recognize all that we have is all that we need and more.

What we have is abundant.

And if you haven't been specifically centered around people why not ask the question who am I grateful for today?

And just explore the why.

Who am I grateful for today?

And why?

Beautifully done.

Let all of that land.

Let it be downloaded on a cellular level so that you really let that sink in,

Into the heart,

Into the mind,

Into the body.

Not just making this a task of the mind but letting it be absorbed now by your body.

Noticing any physical sensations that occur when that is experienced.

And feel free on the back of today's practice to action some of these internal explorations.

Maybe you send a person that you thought about a message just saying hey I'm so grateful for you today and this is why.

Let that gratitude just ripple out from your heart into theirs.

Maybe you just sit and think about it a little bit more.

And the final exploration for our mood boosting practice today.

We're going to tune back into the breath and we're going to do a little bit of breath rhythm in the style of breath work.

Just one round to boost the serotonin,

The oxytocin through our bodies so that we leave feeling really kind of open,

Spacious and positive.

So for this one it's just going to be one round.

There'll be three gear shifts that you can go a little bit quicker or you can just stay with the first gear.

If you're pregnant please stay with the first gear in that rhythm and don't do the breath hold.

If you're not you can go all the way.

If you're seated and you've got something behind you brilliant.

If you don't please make yourself comfortable,

Have something behind you or lie down for this.

We'll be breathing in through the nose and out through the mouth.

It's a sharp and quick inhale through the nose and a really passive exhale through the mouth.

Join me in the rhythm when you can.

Breathing in through the nose,

Out through the mouth.

Breathing in through the nose and out through the mouth.

Inhaling,

Nasal passages open to the breath.

Exhaling you just throw the breath away through the exhale.

Finding your rhythm,

Inhaling and letting it go.

Inhaling and letting it go.

Finding that pulse for yourself with the rhythm that works for you.

Keep it smooth and steady to begin with.

Consistency over intensity here.

And there's no pause,

There's no gap between the inhale and exhale.

Just smoothing into one and the other.

Making it round,

Making it circular.

Option to remain in this rhythm if it works for you today.

Otherwise join me for gear two and it's gonna sound a little bit like this.

Feel free to join this rhythm or find it for yourself.

Inhale,

Exhale.

Inhale,

Exhale.

Inhale,

Exhale.

Inhale,

Exhale.

Inhale,

Exhale.

Inhale,

Exhale.

Inhale,

Exhale.

Inhale,

Exhale.

Inhale,

Exhale.

Continue for just one more minute in the style you're with and then know you can always stay at this rhythm or you can join me for the third and final rhythm that we'll only be doing for 10 seconds.

So please do feel free to join.

And when you're ready to transition,

If you're going to transition with me,

It's going to be in,

Out,

In,

Out,

In,

Out,

In,

Out,

In,

Out,

In.

For five,

For four,

For three,

For two,

And one.

Inhale fully,

The whole body being so bright with pure energy and breath.

Hold for a moment and then slowly exhale through the mouth until 80% of the breath has gone.

So we're still holding around 20% in the body and then just rest and pause without the need to breathe for a few extended moments.

Simply notice what's here in the space between.

And only you know when it's time to bring the breath back in.

And when you do it's just in and out through the nose,

Easy natural breathing.

And just become aware what's here,

What's present for you.

If nothing is there,

That's true for you too,

Like nothingness is something,

Right?

And then starting to feel the support of whatever's beneath you,

That little bit more,

To come back to reality.

Sensing your external environment through your senses,

Maybe listening to any sounds,

Taking in a smell of the room that you're in.

And just starting to let the breath filter back through in a natural easy way.

And in this moment I invite you now to finalize your practice with a note from yourself to yourself.

From this version of you that's just moved through a practice of the self-exploration work we've done,

To your regular self outside of this space.

Do you have a message to tell them?

Could simply be,

Keep going,

You're amazing,

I'm proud of you,

Whatever it is,

See where you can go with that.

And then in your own time with that beautiful thought in your heart,

In your mind,

Start to journey out of your practice through any subtle movements in the body.

Maybe you start to wiggle the fingers and toes,

Maybe you start to blink the eyes open.

And stay open to the rest of the day with this heart-centered vibration.