Welcome to Monday.
This meditation is an opportunity to respond to the complex everyday experiences that lift us up and bring us down.
My name is Jess and I have struggled with meditation and intention and I hope this little offering brings you closer to your purpose for this day.
Today's meditation is on the phenomenon of Monday.
To start,
Let's take five big breaths,
Loud enough that if someone was sitting next to you,
They could hear them.
Deep breathing has been studied and found to change how we engage stress and situations.
It's good for slowing down,
Preparing for Monday,
But it's also a good practice for all kinds of situations we find ourselves in.
As we begin today,
Just feel yourself breathe for one minute,
Then 60 seconds of being your own company,
Quieting your heart and mind as you prepare for this day.
That was literally 60 seconds.
If your mind went to other places just now or happens throughout the time,
It's okay.
It's natural.
You're still here,
So let's move on.
Take one moment to identify a person or situation that you're grateful for as you do this.
As you go into this week,
Let's take a moment of gratitude.
Out loud or in your head,
Express that gratitude.
Monday is the beginning of the work week in a capitalistic society,
But it has become a symbol for how we engage a period of time that we find ourselves doing our normal routine.
We have less freedom over our time,
Engage in stress that may benefit another party.
In the US-American context,
Very few of us have the luxury of not having to devote ourselves to the capitalistic enterprise to make money,
But we can be mindful and intention-setting in how we engage this phenomenon.
Our bodies are an important part of meditation,
So if you're able,
Send your arms out and turn your palms up,
Maybe place your palms on your knees as a posture of release.
Our bodies need rhythms of acceptance and release.
So imagine you wrote on your hands the things about Monday that make you dislike it.
Pause the track and really take a sharpie and write,
Or just imagine you wrote on the palm of your hands as an act of submission.
Let's name the things about Monday that cause us concern as we engage it.
Now we release.
Look at those things on your hand.
Identify which ones you cannot control.
We surrender what we can't control.
So we release the things about Monday that we may not enjoy,
Look forward to,
Or that cause stress.
We can't always live in a world where we only do what we want,
So we need to be faithful with those aspects of our lives and our work and our routines that we may not like.
But by placing meaningful intention,
We can find purpose serving the companies,
Organizations,
Institutions,
Or people that we work.
We see these things in the context of what they are and release the expectations that they'll provide for us what they're not.
In meditation,
We slow down and make commitments to our core foundations.
Spend a minute visualizing how it feels to see this Monday as an opportunity for intention rather than in servitude towards it.
There is a spiritual from the black church tradition that proclaims,
This joy that I have,
The world didn't give it to me.
The world didn't give it and the world can't take it away.
The song changes from this joy to this peace and another verse to this love.
And I have found this incredibly formative for me,
Bases in times when my work and routine lack meaning and purpose.
In essence,
This joy,
This peace,
This love that I have,
Monday didn't give it to me and Monday take it away.
As we conclude our Monday meditation,
We accept the freedom of accepting and release.
We often fight against the good life that is right in front of us,
But we release Monday's hold on our psyche,
Joy,
Our goodness,
Our character,
And our happiness.
Now taking the time today did not make changes to the realities of the job that you may not enjoy or feel oppressed by.
It may have changed your orientation towards it today.
You may need to take some greater steps to get yourself out of this bad situation,
But meditation's greatest gift is not that it suddenly changes our situations,
But often that it changes us.
I wish for you a good Monday.
