Get comfortable,
Find a comfortable position,
Whether it's sitting on a bed or laying down,
Sitting on a meditation cushion or a comfortable chair.
And let your attention come to your body,
And let your awareness come to that level of sensation in your body.
Allow yourself to become more aware of the physical sensations of being in your body.
Notice the sensations of your buttocks on the chair,
Laying on the bed,
The pull of gravity.
Bring your awareness to the sensations of your chest moving back and forth,
Up and down like the ocean in your breath.
Notice the sensations in your neck and the weight of your head.
Feel your body as you lay or sit in your body.
Gradually allow your attention to come to your belly and begin to soften your belly.
Begin to make room for the breath in your belly.
Breathing in,
Your belly rises.
Breathing out,
Your belly falls.
Soften to receive the breath down into your belly.
Notice what it's like to allow your breath to breathe itself into soft belly.
Each breath softening,
Opening,
Releasing.
As you inhale,
Your belly rises,
Filling with softness.
As you exhale,
Your belly falls,
Releasing any holding,
Expanding and contracting your belly as you breathe soft belly.
Allowing your breath to breathe itself in the softness.
Letting go in your belly levels and levels of softness.
So much grief can be held in your belly.
So much fear and armoring.
Let it all float in your soft belly.
Not hardening your belly to suffering,
Just letting your belly be in mercy.
Letting yourself be in soft belly.
Notice how even a single thought can tense your belly,
Hardening it to armoring,
To separation,
To grief.
Letting go with each inhalation,
Softening your belly.
Letting go with each exhalation,
Making space.
Each exhalation,
Breathing out your pain,
Letting it go.
Soft belly,
Merciful belly,
Levels and levels of softening.
Levels and levels of letting go.
So much room for liberation.
So much room to be in soft belly.
Have mercy on you.
Each breath softening.
Softening the belly to uncover the heart.
Letting go in the belly of the holding which locks your heart.
Each exhalation letting go of the pain.
Breathing out the hardness,
The armoring,
Making room for your life in your soft belly.
Expectation,
Judgment,
Doubt.
Old griefs congregate in our bellies.
Softening allows them to disperse,
To dissolve in our soft bellies.
Pains,
Fears,
Doubts,
Dissolving.
Dissolving into the softness,
The spaciousness of your merciful belly.
Let it all float in your soft belly.
Have mercy.
Levels and levels of softening meeting the moment.
Levels and levels of being in your soft belly.
Breathing in,
Breathing out of your soft belly.
Even if hardness is discovered in the midst of increasing softness,
Just watch it float through.
Let the hardness float in the softness.
Nothing to change.
No urgency in your soft belly.
Let urgency float in the softness.
Room even for the pain in the mercy and awareness of your soft belly.
Let the sound of these words pass right through you.
Releasing everywhere.
Letting go everywhere.
Not holding anywhere.
Trust the process.
Let all that arises pass through the spaciousness of soft belly.
And then let your eyes gently open.
And as your eyes open,
Notice at what point your belly tightens once again.
And at what point does someone-ness reasserts herself and you feel a need to protect?
At what point does the armoring reestablish its long presence?
Softening with eyes wide open to the world.
Softening to the pain we all share and the legacy of healing exposed in the deepening softness.
