Awareness of body and breath meditation.
Intention.
Practice waking up to automatic pilot.
Allowing thoughts and feelings to come and go without getting caught up in them.
Attention.
The breath,
The body and the senses.
Attitude.
Non-striving,
Non-judging.
Allowing the experience to be as it is.
Curiosity to our experience in the present moment.
Settling into a comfortable sitting position.
Fusing a chair.
Practicing sitting away from the back of the chair so that the spine is self-supporting.
Having the feet flat on the floor with legs uncrossed.
Where I want the hands rest today.
Taking time to experiment with the posture to find a place of comfort.
When you're ready gently closing the eyes if that feels comfortable.
If not,
Letting the gaze fall unfocused on the floor a short distance in front.
Feeling the sitting bones on the chair or cushion.
Awareness of the sense of touch.
Tuning into the sensations of the body.
Perhaps feeling a lightness or expansion in the spine.
The head balanced on top.
Finding a position for the head where it is not too far forward or too far back.
The shoulders falling away from the neck.
Moving the attention to the sense of hearing.
Noticing sounds outside of the room.
Practicing not identifying the sounds.
Just moving from sound to sound.
Just like the breath,
The sounds have a beginning,
A middle and an end.
Moving to sounds inside the room.
Allowing sounds to come and go as they please.
Making a choice to allow ourselves to be exactly as we are in this moment.
Practicing awareness of thoughts and emotions as they come and go.
Awareness of the sense of touch.
Paying particular attention to awareness of sensations in the body as we encounter them.
When it feels right,
Gently noticing the movement of the breath.
It's such a constant feature of life that it's easy to ignore.
Taking time with it now.
Actually feeling the sensations as the breath rolls in and rolls out.
Allowing it to move through its circle of in-breath and out-breath without controlling.
Perhaps sensing the rise and fall of the belly or the feeling of the air in the nostrils or upper lip.
Maybe placing the hand on the belly.
Feeling the movement of the breath,
The rhythm.
Letting it roll in and roll out.
Riding the waves of the breath from moment to moment.
This breath and now this breath.
When does the in-breath become the out-breath?
As we practice this meditation,
If at any time sensations in the body become too uncomfortable,
Thoughts carry us away to the past or the future.
Our emotions arise that are too difficult,
Remembering that it is always possible to return to the rhythm of the breath as a refuge.
Practicing coming back and being with the breath,
All the feet on the floor as an anchor,
Until ready to venture again into the meditation.
Just tuning in and listening to the sound of my voice once again.
What is the experience at this moment?
Moving awareness to the level of physical sensations in the body.
Investigating the experience of aliveness in this body.
How is this aliveness known through the senses?
What is our experience in the body?
And now perhaps bringing the attention to the sensations of touch,
Contact and pressure where the body makes contact with what you are sitting on.
Exploring these sensations.
Bringing awareness to the breath in the body,
To the changing patterns of physical sensations in the body.
The expansion on the in-breath and coming back on the out-breath.
Why can the breath be felt most vividly today?
Perhaps the nostrils,
The top of the lip,
The throat or the belly?
Maybe imagining a balloon in the chest or belly.
Every time we breathe in,
Noticing that the balloon inflates.
Every time we breathe out,
Noticing that the balloon deflates.
Inflating.
Deflating.
As best we can,
Staying in touch with the changing physical sensations in the belly for the full duration of the in-breath and the full duration of the out-breath.
Is there a slight pause between the in-breath and the following out-breath?
And between an out-breath and the following in-breath?
When does the in-breath become the out-breath?
There is no need to try to control the breathing in any way.
Simply letting the body breathe by itself.
As best we can,
Bringing a freshness,
A beginner's mind to exploring the body as we breathe.
There is nothing that needs to be fixed.
And no particular state to be achieved.
Simply surrendering to the experience as it is.
Without requiring it to be any different.
Just inhaling and exhaling.
At one moment we may be aware of the senses.
Aware of sounds as they come and go.
Or physical sensations.
And in another,
The rise and fall of emotion.
Practicing letting go and gently coming back to the anchor of the breath.
The sensations of the bottom of the chair feed on the floor.
What is our experience?
When thoughts come into the mind,
Which they may well do as that's what minds do,
Simply watching them.
And with a gentle curiosity,
Noticing if we get caught up in them.
What would it feel like to let them go?
We do not have to follow those thoughts or feelings or analyse them in any way.
Softening any judgements about having them.
Just noticing thoughts and letting them drift on by.
Choosing to come back to the body.
Back to the anchor of the breath.
Feed on the floor.
When we notice that our attention has drifted off.
That our attention is becoming caught up in sensations,
Thoughts or emotions.
Simply noticing that the attention has drifted.
And then coming back to the breath.
It's okay and natural for thoughts to enter into our awareness and for our attention to follow them.
No matter how many times this happens,
Just keep bringing your attention back to your breathing.
We are practicing flexing our mindfulness muscle.
When you are ready,
Expanding the attention to include the entire body from the soles of the feet to the top of the head.
Being present to the totality of the experience of sitting here at this moment.
Gathering into the sensations of the breath.
Noticing how it has been here with us the whole time.
How it is bringing the body together,
Keeping it alive.
Feeling the earth beneath us.
A sense of sitting here in this present moment.
The breath rolling in.
And rolling out down into the ground.
Breathing in.
And breathing out down into the earth,
Earthing ourselves.
When you are ready,
Gently turning our awareness to sounds in the room.
The sounds outside of the room.
Starting to feel the space around us.
Maybe stretching and moving in any way that feels good right now.
And when you are ready,
Opening the eyes.
The meditation is now complete.
