Release To Make Space | 17-Min

And as this meditation practice commences,

Just notice before we go anywhere together,

How are you meeting this very moment?

Are you welcoming of the practice?

Are you feeling a bit distant to it?

Just notice how you're meeting your meditation practice as we drop in and see if you can transform what's ever there into openness,

Into receptivity,

Into the inward space.

So as the eyelids gently close over the eyeballs fully now,

You start to drop into the space within.

Noticing anything externally that is present,

Sounds,

Smells or touches,

But choosing to hold your awareness within.

And as we journey within,

Start to notice your breath.

As you notice your breath,

Are you able to start a slowing down process?

Start to draw the breath a little deeper into the body through the back of the lungs,

The sides and the front.

And just slowing down time now through the conscious shaping of your breath.

Notice how when you start to slow the breath down,

It's almost like time moves at a different rate.

As you're here present to your breath and you're slowing down the motion,

Again just paying attention to any sounds around you and then choosing to stay within.

You can do both.

You can come from a space within and still acknowledge what's around you.

And in this space within,

Just noticing any thoughts that crop up.

See if you can witness them,

Observe them without getting wrapped into them and following them or adding on to them.

Are you able just to observe your thoughts for the next 60 seconds?

And as you observe the thoughts that are present,

Notice what flavor they are in terms of past or present.

What movements are your minds making when in autopilot?

Do they drift off into the future or drop and dip into the past?

Or can your mind gently place its awareness here now through the breath?

And you might even put those words upon the breath now as we arrive fully,

As you breathe in internally repeating here and now as you exhale through the breath.

Here and now through the breath.

And for any time in today's practice that the mind dances off and you need an anchor to come back to,

You could either choose just the breath itself,

The feeling state of the breath,

Or you can come to that mantra.

Here and now through the breath.

Beautifully done.

From here we're going to explore our breath just a little further today.

And we choose to explore our serene breath.

This breathing technique involves an extension of the exhale to support an unwinding of our nervous system on the deepest of levels.

But when we start to extend the exhale breath,

We're tuning into our rest and digest system.

So for the next time that you breathe in,

Count to four.

And the next time you breathe out,

Count down from six.

Breathing in for four and out for six.

Counting down from six.

Let everything else fade away and just listen to the oceanic quality of your breath.

That very subtle hush,

Almost like the wind on the surface of a wave.

This is the practice for the next minute or so.

Commit to it fully and notice where you go.

A few more rounds of serene breath just here.

In for four,

Out for six.

Counting down from six.

Beautifully done.

Gently releasing that shaping of the breath and simply return to an easy natural breathing style now.

In and out through the nose and just take a moment.

Notice,

Did anything change internally through that practice?

Just a few moments of shaping the breath.

What has it done for you today?

Just observe.

And from here we're going to be going on a journey of the body and releasing and relaxing the body.

It is quite easy to drift into a sleepy state during this style of practice.

So if you'd prefer not to go there,

Just find the breath at any time and you simply take a deeper inhale and a slow exhale just to come back into that state of awareness.

If you are fine to go into a sleepy state,

Just let this wash over you today.

Starting with your awareness now,

Down in the soles of the feet.

I invite you to just acknowledge your soles of your feet and then sense.

Is there anything felt here in the soles of the feet?

Maybe a warmth,

Maybe a tingling,

Maybe a coolness.

Just notice and witness this for the next few moments.

And here I invite you to relax and release the feet fully.

So imagine any tension that might be working its way into the very small fibers of your feet.

Imagine all of that tension,

Any of that tension just dissolving now like melted butter.

Softening and settling,

Releasing and relaxing.

And allow that softness,

That melting feeling to gently work its way up through the calves of the legs.

Both knees softening,

Releasing,

Relaxing.

The thighs soften fully now.

Any tension being held in the groin or the hips.

Relax,

Relax,

Release.

We can often store tension or built-up energy in this region of our body in the hip area.

We can do it unconsciously without knowing and then when someone says to you relax your hips,

You didn't actually realize until that moment that they were tight.

You're like bracing and holding in but you have full permission right here to let it all go.

Gently bringing your awareness to your stomach,

To the chest,

Inclusive of the shoulders.

And just like that image of butter melting,

The body softens in those regions.

From the shoulders allowing your awareness to soften down the length of the arms until you stay within the palms of the hands.

In the palms of the hands simply notice that feeling of relaxation washed through you.

All the way to the very fingertips and fingernails,

This softness here.

And then gently bringing your awareness up to the top of the head and just like a warm shower coming down from the top of your head,

Imagine the water were softening all of the facial muscles,

The eyes,

Cheeks.

Not only external features but also the brain,

The skull.

Relaxing and releasing.

Here we consciously release any mental tension that is not serving us.

Any tightness or knotting in the mind space,

You can let it go.

Imagine something open and spacious,

Instead present.

And staying now within that image of something spacious,

Perhaps the vista of the ocean,

Perhaps an open desert.

Whatever feels spacious to you to visualize,

Stay with that image now and simply breathe into that image for the next few rounds of breath.

What does that image conjure within you?

And that's what we've been working with in our practice today.

Releasing and unknotting so we can find a sense of spaciousness through release so that we can reset.

Starting to sense the body fully now,

The entire body here in space.

Notice what parts of your body are being held by the support beneath you.

Noticing any sounds in your space and starting to gently come back and out.

In your own time you might find some subtle movements in the fingers,

The toes,

Maybe you'd find a bit of a neck roll if that feels good.

And only when you're ready to come back into your space,

You start to blink the eyes open.

Feeling refreshed,

Having more space from within and ready to move into the next phase of this day.